This article will help you get a rough idea of printing a business card and the costs associated with that.
For extremely basic business cards--white paper, black text--it's unlikely that the cost of printing is going to exceed the revenue each card is expected to bring in.
Business cards are typically printed on card stock--eighty-pound paper and up, in contrast to the standard twenty or twenty-four pound paper used for most documents.
At standard card sizes (in America, about 3.
5" x 2"), one 8.
5" x 11" sheet of card stock will yield some ten business cards.
Taking into account ink and paper costs, this will set you back about ten cents for every sheet of ten cards you print at the local copy store, assuming that you do your own design and layout.
To cut the cards, expect to pay more: about $1.
50 for machine cutting is a standard rate at large copy stores, and a sheet of business cards will require about five cuts horizontally and three cuts vertically in order to separate and trim all of the cards.
That's eight cuts, or an extra $12--which seems high, until you consider that multiple sheets can be cut at the same time, and for the same price.
So for one sheet of ten cards, expect to pay about $1.
30 per card, while for one hundred sheets of one thousand cards, expect to pay about $22, or two cents per card--a considerably lower figure.
You might want to shop around some in your area and pay a fair price, although sometimes the time cost involved in shopping around is higher than the cost to just pay a slightly higher first-quote price.