Brochure or catalogue: what to print, what to keep digital

"Do I print five hundred of the big book, or just send a PDF?" Start from who will hold it. A brochure introduces your firm in a few pages. A catalogue lists what you sell, with the details a buyer needs to order. Print the catalogue for dealers and walk-ins who want something in the hand, and keep prices off it. Buyers abroad get a compressed PDF cut from the same master file. With a small range, skip the brochure: one catalogue with a two-page opener will do.

What does each one do?

A brochure is read once, and quickly. It answers "who are these people?" in the time a buyer spends on a stand or in a waiting room: what you make, who you supply, where you are, how to reach you. A catalogue is kept. People return to it to answer "what exactly do I order?", so it has codes, dimensions, materials, pack sizes and photographs good enough to identify a part.

A forty-page document that opens with six pages of history is a brochure no one finishes and a catalogue no one can find a part in. For the catalogue itself, see writing a product catalogue a purchase engineer will keep.

Which one for which reader?

How does one master file give three outputs?

Build the catalogue once in a layout tool and export from it, so corrections happen in one place.

1. Master file. Every product page, with the specification table as live text, not an image. Keep the opener pages as a separate section.
2. Print export. Add bleed and crop marks, high-resolution photographs and a binding gap on the inner margin. Leave out price columns.
3. PDF export. Compress photographs, keep text searchable, name the file with your brand and range, such as Kaveri-Fittings-Catalogue.pdf, and put the date inside the document.
4. Loose sheets. Price list and new items printed separately, so a revision does not mean a reprint.

If your master file is a series of screenshots pasted into slides, rebuilding it is the first job. You cannot keep a catalogue current from pictures of pictures.

An invented example: a laboratory-glassware maker in Ambala

Imagine a glassware maker in Ambala selling beakers, flasks and burettes to dealers who supply college and testing labs, and sending samples to importers in West Asia and Africa. The firm printed a heavy catalogue of two hundred items in several sizes. Dealers liked holding it. The printed price column went stale within months, and the 40 MB PDF it sent abroad bounced from mail servers.

The revised plan used one master file, with items grouped by use and capacity. The printed catalogue dropped prices and gained a QR code to a live price sheet. A lighter PDF went to importers with the top fifty items and a note that the full range was on request. The brochure shrank to four pages, for fairs only.

Rebuilding the master took longer than the owner expected, because half the old pages existed only as screenshots. The first importer who got the light PDF asked for prices anyway. Both problems came from one habit: one document had to serve every reader.

How many pages, and what do you cut?

There is no right number. Use these rules instead.

• One product to a page when parts need a drawing or a table. Two when they are simple.
• A contents page and a code index at the back for any range over about thirty items.
• No page that exists only to say "quality is our priority".
• Plain backgrounds. A hand or a coin in frame gives size.
• Contact details on every spread of the PDF, but only on the cover and back of the printed one.

How many do you print?

Count the people who will physically hold it in the next season: dealers you visit, walk-ins you expect, fairs you will attend. Add a small spare. Do not print for hoped-for demand. A short run of the stable core costs less than a pallet that goes out of date, and you can always reprint.

What do you check before it goes to the printer?

Print one proof copy and read it with a pencil. Does every code in the index lead to the right page? Does each photograph match the name under it? Are the phone number and address current? Then hand it to a dealer and ask them to find three parts. If they cannot, the layout needs work, not the printing.

When should you print nothing?

If you sell to ten known buyers who order by WhatsApp, a printed catalogue may not earn its cost. A well-named PDF and a few clear photographs will do. If your range changes every season, print small runs of the stable core and handle the rest digitally.

Regulated goods need care. For food, health products or electrical items, the rules about what must appear on the pack and in the literature differ by state and body and change. Check with your own adviser before the layout is fixed.

What to do this week

Go through the enquiries you can still find and note where each buyer first saw your range. That tells you what to print and what to keep as a file. Then check that your catalogue exists as one master with live text. If you want help turning a stack of mismatched documents into one master, GullySales offers brochures, catalogues and marketing materials, the marketing hub lists the rest of the material work, and the first step is to tell us what you need.