Visiting Cards & Identity Print

Three decisions drive a visiting card order: board weight, finish, and embellishment. The baseline is 300 to 350 GSM art board, a stiff coated stock that holds a clean edge and will not fatigue in a wallet. Most corporate runs stop here, and correctly.

Above that, 600 GSM cotton duplex is the card handed back and forth at a meeting. It will not bend, and the edge itself can be colored. Velvet soft-touch film kills glare; hot foil and 3D raised UV add reflection and texture. Each one is a separate pass on the floor, so the price stacks.

GSM is grams per square meter, and in cards it tracks almost directly with stiffness. A 300 GSM sheet bends between two fingers. A 600 GSM duplex board will not bend at all, which is why people remember it.

Velvet soft-touch is a laminated film, not a coating. It leaves a suede-like nap, and colors read denser underneath because the film scatters less light than a glossy laminate. The tradeoff is that dark solids show fingerprints, so it suits mid-tone artwork better than full black backgrounds.

Cards print on sheets, laminate where the spec calls for it, then cut to the 3.25 by 2.0 inch standard or the 3.5 by 2.2 inch oversized format. Every job gets a 300 DPI CMYK prepress check before plating, which catches bleed and font-outline problems while they are still cheap to fix.

Foil and 3D raised UV are separate operations after print. Foil needs solid vector shapes, not gradients. Raised UV is a cured polymer that sits above the surface, which is what your thumbnail feels. Both add working days, so give us your event date when you ask for a quote.