Stationery brands: why a notebook buyer wants to see the paper before paying

The notebook reviews that hurt a stationery brand are often about the paper, not the cover. They say the ink showed through, the paper was cream when the buyer wanted white, or the book would not lie flat near the spine. In a shop the buyer checks all of that by hand before paying. Online, show the paper the way they would test it, and for buyers who still hesitate, sell a small swatch pack.

What a buyer does with a notebook in a shop

Watch someone choose a notebook at a stationery counter. They open it in the middle and press it flat. They rub a page between finger and thumb. If the shopkeeper allows it, they write a line on the last page with their own pen and turn it over to look at the back. The cover got them to pick it up. The paper decides whether they pay.

Online, none of that happens unless your photographs do it for them. And the buyers want different things. Students want the ruling, the page count and a price. Journal writers want dot grid and paper that takes markers. Fountain pen users care about bleed above everything else. A purchase manager ordering three hundred for a conference wants their logo on the cover and paper that will not embarrass them.

GSM is a number buyers half understand

Paper weight is sold as GSM, grams per square metre, and buyers have learnt that a bigger number is better. That is only partly true. GSM tells you weight. It does not tell you how ink behaves, which depends on how the paper is made and finished. Two 80 gsm papers can behave quite differently under the same pen.

State the GSM, then show the behaviour. And learn the two words fountain pen users will put in their reviews. Ghosting is writing that shows faintly through from the other side. Bleed-through is ink that reaches the back of the page and marks it. Many papers ghost a little with dark ink. Bleed is the one that costs you the sale.

The paper shot list

Shoot this for every paper you sell, not for every cover. Ten cover designs on one paper need one set of paper photographs.

• The open page in daylight beside a sheet of ordinary printer paper, so the colour is judged against something the buyer knows.
• A pen test: one line each in ballpoint, gel pen, a fountain pen with a medium nib, highlighter and felt-tip, each labelled in the frame.
• That same page turned over, photographed flat and then held up to a window.
• A steel ruler laid across the ruling, so the line spacing in millimetres is visible.
• Close to the spine, with the notebook open on a table and no hand holding it down. If it does not lie flat, show that too.
• One shot in a hand, for size.

Our note on product photography on a small budget covers the light and the phone settings. Then write one spec line, in the same order, on every product:

Paper: 100 gsm, ivory, smooth. Ruling: 5 mm dot grid. Pages: 160, numbered. Binding: thread-sewn, lies flat. Pen test: no bleed with gel or medium fountain pen; slight ghosting with felt-tip.

The last clause does the most work. A buyer who sees you own up to the felt-tip ghosting will take your word on the fountain pen.

The swatch pack, and who it is for

A swatch pack is a few small cards of each paper you sell, one per ruling, sized to fit an ordinary envelope. The buyer writes on them with their own pens at their own desk, which is the shop test done at home. Charge a small amount and give it back as a code on the first notebook.

It earns its place in three situations. A brand with several papers at different prices, where the buyer cannot tell which one they need. Fountain pen and journaling buyers, who will pay to test before buying an expensive book. And corporate orders: when a company is choosing paper for a few hundred notebooks, send the swatches with the quotation so the purchase manager can pass them round the office.

Skip it if you sell one paper, or school notebooks by the dozen. Those buyers want ruling, page count and price, and the photographs already show them.

For example: a Sivakasi maker's first premium range

Take an invented case: a notebook maker in Sivakasi that had printed school notebooks for years and launched a premium journal range online. The listings said "premium 100 gsm paper" and showed each journal closed, on a wooden desk. The early reviews were about one thing. Ink bled through.

The paper was fine with gel pens and ballpoints. It was never made for wet fountain pen inks, and nothing on the page said so. Before touching the listings, the maker ran the pen test on both of the papers it used. The lighter paper's spec line now says "not for fountain pens", and the heavier paper became the fountain pen range, priced to match. A swatch pack with both papers went on sale. In this illustration, the fountain pen complaints stopped within a season, but the lighter paper's sales fell by about a fifth, because some buyers wanted a cheaper fountain pen notebook and the maker did not make one.

What to do next

Run the pen test today on the paper you sell most of, with the pens your buyers actually use. Then turn the page over. If the back surprises you, it will surprise them too. Listings built around the paper are e-commerce and marketplace marketing work, and stationery sits in our e-commerce sales and marketing section. If the photographs, spec lines or swatch pack need doing, tell us what you need.