Business card
Business cards contain firm or individual information. These are provided during formal introductions for convenience and recollection. A business card usually includes the giver’s name, firm or business affiliation (usually with a logo), street addresses, phone numbers, fax numbers, e-mail addresses, and websites. Telex numbers were on business cards before the internet. Facebook, LinkedIn, and X (previously Twitter) addresses are now allowed. Traditionally, many cards had black writing on white material, and engraved plates gave them a professional look and feel. Technological improvements in the late 20th century changed business card design, and today’s cards commonly incorporate QR codes or NFC-enabled cards.
The globe printed 7 billion business cards annually before the COVID-19 pandemic.Vistaprint reports that card sales plunged 70% during the pandemic, but the business recovered in 2024, with global revenue reaching US$4.5 billion.
Construction
Business cards are produced on card stock, with graphic effects, printing methods, costs, and other features ranging by culture, organization, and personal preference. Business cards vary in weight by area. Business cards are commonly printed on 250-350 g/m² (90-130 lb cover) card paper with 10-16 pt thickness, with regional and personal preferences influencing standards.[6]
Personal laser and inkjet printers allowed consumers to print business cards at home using pre-cut paper. These cards were initially lighter and had holes along the edges, but printer and paper advances have made them professional-looking.
Sheet-fed offset printing presses use spot colours to make high-quality business cards without full-color photos. Some corporations trademark their spot colours, like UPS brown, Owens-Corning pink, and Cadbury purple.[5] Two-color business cards have a single-color logo and a different-colored typeface. Card needs can determine spot colour additions. Digital and batch printing make full-color business card printing affordable.
Thermography, a cheaper alternative to engraving, uses plastic powder to attach to wet ink to replicate the look. The plastic is melted on the cards by a heating machine. Similar effects can be achieved with spot UV varnish over matte laminate.
Sheetfed presses also print full-color cards using the CMYK four-color process. Several colour screens overprinted on each other give a wide colour range. Screened colours show tiny spots when inspected carefully, while spot colour cards are usually solid. Simple cards with line art or non-black typography under 5 points should use spot colours.
Some full-color printing terms:
4/0: Full-color front, no back print
4/1—full colour front/one colour back
4/4: full-color front/back
The names are pronounced “four over zero”, “four over one”, and “four over four”.
UV glossy coatings are available for business cards. An additional unit on a sheetfed press applies the coat like ink. However, UV coatings can be spot-coated, leaving other parts unprotected. This expands design options. UV Coating is different from coated stock, which is gloss or semi-gloss before printing.
Many modern printing firms use high-end “Digital Presses,” which are different from office copiers, to print business cards. These range from light production units like the Konica Minolta Bizhub 5500 to state-of-the-art units like the HP Indigo Digital Presses.
The latest digital presses can print on 407 g/m2 (150# cover material) and polypropylene, unlike previous office copiers. Many modern sheet-fed and web-fed digital presses can replicate Pantone spot colours, print seven colours in one pass, and include incorporated spectrophotometers and air-assisted feeding systems.
UV coats and aqueous coatings speed card production. Undried cards “offset”—the ink from one card’s front marks the back of the next. Aqueous coatings last longer but are less obvious than UV coatings, which are glossy and fingerprint-prone. A dark aqueous coating on uncoated stock makes durable cards, and UV coating or plastic lamination can thicken thin stocked cards and make them more robust.
Card designs with bleeds have colour that extends beyond the cut size. (A bleed extends printed lines or colours beyond the paper’s cut line.) This ensures that the paper cuts without white edges since the blade cuts the cards at very small angles, making it nearly difficult to cut without. A hair off can cause white lines, and the blade will pull the paper while cutting. The picture on the paper can bounce from page to page, which is usually off by a hairline on an offset press but can be enormous on a copier or duplicator press. Cards usually have bleeds of 3.175 (1⁄8) to 6.35 mm (1⁄4 in) on all sides.
US
Bleed size: 95.25 x 57.15 mm (3.75 x 2.25 in). (1/8 bleeds)
Standard cut size: 89 x 51 mm (3.5 x 2 in).
UK
Bleed size: 91 x 61 mm (3.58 x 2.40 in).
Standard cut size: 85 x 55 mm (3.35 x 2.17 in).
Side fold and “tent” cards are also popular. Cards usually fold to regular size.
Both sides of cards can be printed in various languages.
Dimensions
Aspect ratios are 1.42–1.8. No standard business card measurements exist.[8] Combining card dimensions simplifies storage, as payment cards (85.60 × 53.98 mm) and Western European business cards (85 × 55 mm) are similar in size.
Country/Standardmm dimensionsInside dimensionsThe aspect ratio
Size: ISO 216, A8 (74 x 52).2.913 × 2.047 1.423
ISO 216, C881 × 573.189 × 2.244 1.421
Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Nepal, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Slovenia, Turkey, UK85 × 55 3.346 × 2.165 1.545
ISO/IEC 7810 ID-1, credit card-sized Australia85.60 × 53.98 3.370 × 2.125 1.586
New Zealand, Norway, Taiwan, Sweden, Vietnam, Australia, Colombia, Denmark90 × 55 3.54 × 2.165 1.636
Japan91 × 55 3.582 × 2.165 1.655
China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore90 × 54 3.543 × 2.125 1.667
Canada, USA88.9 × 50.8 3.5 × 2 1.75
Iran85 x 48 3.346 × 1.889 1.771
Argentina, Brazil, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Croatia, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, India, Israel, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Mexico, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Sri Lanka, South Africa, South Korea, Ukraine, Uzbe90 × 50 3.543 × 1.968 1.8
ISO 216, B888 × 62 3.465 × 2.441 1.419
Global changes
Japan
A Japanese business card is called a meishi (名刺). It usually begins with the corporate name in huge print, followed by the job title and the person’s name. Japanese characters appear on one side and Latin characters on the other. Business address, phone number, and fax number are frequently supplied. Meishi may include a QR code for machine-readable contact information, but this is not yet common. Fewer than 3% of Japanese own a QR-coded meishi, according to a 2007 poll.[10]
Meishi presentation is more formal and ritualistic than in the West. The recipient reads the meishi by taking it by the bottom two corners with both hands from the top two corners, face up. Fingering a name or other information is disrespectful. After getting the meishi, read the card to note the person’s name and rank. Thank the other person with “choudai itashimasu” (“I accept your name card”) or “choudai shimasu” and bow.[11] When exchanging meishi, such as between a company president and a middle manager, the lower-status person should place their business card underneath or below the higher-status person’s.
Meishi should be stored in a nice leather case to avoid warming or wearing, which are signs of contempt or thoughtlessness. A received meishi should be filed in the leather case’s back, not written on or placed in a pocket. If offered at a table, the recipient keeps the meishi on the leather case until they leave. If multiple meishi are given in a meeting, the highest-ranking is kept on the leather case and the rest on the table.
How the recipient treats the presenter’s meishi indicates how they will treat the presenter. Folding the card in half or putting the presenter’s meishi in one’s back pocket are insults.[12]
Japanese CEOs and officials commonly have two meishi: one in Japanese for fellow Japanese (family name first) and one in Western order for foreigners.[13]
Other formats
Various technological breakthroughs made Compact Disc “business cards” with 35 to 100 MB of data possible. These CDs are about the same size as a business card and can be square, round, or oblong. CD business cards fit in a computer’s 80 mm CD-ROM tray. Most tray CD drives play them, while slot-loading drives don’t. Though available, these discs were never widely used as business cards despite their capacity to include dynamic presentations and a lot of data.
As mobile computers and smartphones become more common, business card data is shared electronically via direct wireless connections (e.g. infrared, Bluetooth, RFID), SMS, specialized apps (e.g. HiHello)[14], QR codes, NFC[15], or cloud services Again, these new business information transmission technologies have not yet replaced the real business card.
Special Materials
PVC business cards, notably frosted translucent, crystal clear, white, or metallic plastic, are available in addition to paper cards. Metal, rubbery cards, magnets, poker chips, wooden nickels, and actual wood are also unusual. Special material business cards are usually standard, with rounded corners.
Use business card software to print business cards at home or in a printshop. Business card design software usually includes design, layout, and text editing tools. Most business card software integrates with mail clients or address books to minimize laborious contact data entry. Cards are frequently printed on business card paper or sent to a printshop electronically. Many Linux, macOS, and Windows programs are available.
