[Macola]

A friend asked me about this--she's a fairly new (and good) designer who has a full-time job. She's considering freelancing to generate some extra income, and she wants to contact local print shops, send a resume/portfolio, etc.

I did some freelance work for a "quick printer" many years ago, so I'm somewhat out of touch with this segment of the market. I'd like to hear from anyone here who is doing this currently. I don't imagine the pay is great, but that's probably okay for her at this point. Examples of shops around here are places like Kinkos, Econoprint, InstyPrints, etc.--basically any printers who also offer DTP services.

[I WAS the One]

Originally Posted by Macola

A friend asked me about this--she's a fairly new (and good) designer who has a full-time job. She's considering freelancing to generate some extra income, and she wants to contact local print shops, send a resume/portfolio, etc.

I did some freelance work for a "quick printer" many years ago, so I'm somewhat out of touch with this segment of the market. I'd like to hear from anyone here who is doing this currently. I don't imagine the pay is great, but that's probably okay for her at this point. Examples of shops around here are places like Kinkos, Econoprint, InstyPrints, etc.--basically any printers who also offer DTP services.

I'm a freelance GA and my advice to her is that make a great portfolio a very good one, and hit the street to find good clients, forget about kinkos and all that, out there are many people with small and big business that want to be in the art process of and idea or something that their business is envolved at, right now I'm doing ads for a local news paper and also all the publishing of a local Hilton Hotel (in fact they send you the pantone color codes and all the measurments!!)

so find a client is the better choice!

[Macola]

Good point, but I don't want her competing with me...

Seriously, though, she's aware of the freelance market. Her thinking in contacting printers is that she wouldn't have to do a lot of marketing, and it would be a fairly steady stream of work. The tradeoff, as I mentioned, is that the hourly rates are lower. Having run my own business for a while now, I can attest to the fact that marketing/business development takes up far more of my time than I would like, so I can sympathize with her.

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by Macola

Good point, but I don't want her competing with me...

Seriously, though, she's aware of the freelance market. Her thinking in contacting printers is that she wouldn't have to do a lot of marketing, and it would be a fairly steady stream of work. The tradeoff, as I mentioned, is that the hourly rates are lower. Having run my own business for a while now, I can attest to the fact that marketing/business development takes up far more of my time than I would like, so I can sympathize with her.

I suggest she register with one of the temp agencies. Aquent, ( http://marcom.aquent.com ) and the Creative Group, ( http://www.creativegroup.com ) are two of the larger ones.

[hmccorkle]

Hey Macola, I'm a student just about to head off to the Savannah College of Art and Design in about 2 days, and I was hired on as a Graphic Designer at a local (and very very aged) print shop: Campbell Printing.

The pay, for just being temporary, was $12 per hour. I wouldn't expect anything less for your friend. There was a constant constant workflow of rather easy things to do: change names on business cards, make a new layout for a company's flyer, print plates, stuff like that.

It was fun, and I worked on a beautiful dual 1.8ghz PowerMac G5 with a 20-something inch widescreen LCD. The only drawback, really, was management (Jim Cambell himself) who simply didn't understand how layout and graphic design really works. Another was listening to a soft rock station all day, and the last was the strong acidic smell of the chemicals used in printing. I'm sure these elements differ with each print shop, but you get my drift.

It's not as freelance as it sounds. You still get on payroll and work for a boss. You still have jobs and duties and all that, on-site.

Being a student, this was the highest paying job I've had (I've worked in retail for around 3 years), and I learned a bunch. I would recommend your friend work in a print shop because you work with many many different people and companies, all of which are *usually* regulated by the traffic controller or in my case: the boss.

Keep me updated on her progress! Just send me a private message.

[tgags]

Hi,

I have worked for two print shops in the past. I would say you don't need an awesome portfolio as you would need to get into a design firm. Just some basic printed samples would suffice.

The main thing with print shop art departments is pre-press and quick turnaround, not so much design.

She'd need to know...
- about setting up files "2 up", 4 up, etc. (they run most jobs on large sheets of paper). We mostly used QuarkXpress)
- sending files to a RIP, and experience with running film and plates (unless they have digital presses)
- **troubleshooting files that come in from customers** (like when people do design work in Powerpoint, Word and Publisher)
- Difference between CMYK (4-color process), and Pantone (Spot color) printing
- Troubleshooting incorectly setup PDF files (and maybe the ability to use CrackerJack and PitStop Pro.

Those are the main things. If she can boast some of those things, she will get hired. The only thing with freelance with them is it's mostly feast or famine.

(the pay, depending on her experience level would be anywhere between $10-25 hr, not much more)

Hope that helps.
TG

[Macola]

Thanks, all. I'll forward the info.

[yugyug]

I work in a print shop now and everything tgags said is spot on - actually I really enjoy it, while a lot of it is quite technical and any concepting work is 'precious' (cos there's hardly any) , a lot of the skills I've learnt have helped me design better esp. knowing how 'ink' goes down onto 'paper' - sometimes its seems I spend most of my time talking to the printer.