Visited a print shop in Portland and saw why clients keep ghosting designers

I stopped by a local print shop in Portland last Tuesday to pick up some business cards. While I was there, I watched a designer drop off a file that was clearly set up in the wrong color space. The shop owner told her it would cost extra to fix it and she got super defensive. It made me realize a lot of us skip the basics like preflighting files and then wonder why clients get frustrated. How do you handle teaching clients about print specs without sounding like a jerk?

2 comments

2 Comments

wyatt_mitchell2623h ago

Man, that's rough. But honestly the blame goes both ways. Designers gotta own their file prep, that's just part of the job. Clients aren't gonna care about CMYK vs RGB or bleed margins, they just want their stuff to look right and show up on time. You gotta keep it real simple with clients. Tell them "your file needs to be in this format or it'll print wrong." Don't give them a lecture, just give them a checklist. Most people will follow basic steps if you make it easy. The key is to catch these issues before the client ever sees them. Run your own preflight checks, fix the small stuff yourself, then only flag the big problems. That saves face for everyone and keeps the project moving.

lilya7620h agoTop Commenter

Totally agree. I had a client once send me a PDF with images pulled straight from Instagram and wondered why they looked like pixelated garbage on a billboard. Now I just send them a one page "here's what I need" list and it saves me so many headaches.