Why vague briefs produce useless quotes
Ask three printers to quote "5,000 brochures" and you will get three different numbers for three different products. One assumed 4 pages, one assumed 8, one assumed a heavier stock. None of them is wrong; the brief was.
Seven details remove almost all of that.
1. What it is, precisely
Not "brochure" but "A4 landscape, 8 pages including cover, saddle stitched". The format decides the imposition, and the imposition decides the price.
2. Quantity - and the quantity above it
Ask for the run you want and the next slab up. Per-piece cost falls as the run grows, and the break is often much closer than expected.
3. Size, flat and finished
Especially for anything folded or die-cut. A finished size without a flat size leaves the printer guessing at the sheet.
4. Paper or substrate
If you know it, say it. If you do not, describe what it has to do - shelf, outdoor, handled daily, posted - and let the printer specify it and explain why.
5. Colours and finishing
Full colour both sides or one? Lamination, spot UV, foiling, die-cutting, numbering? Each is a pass, and each pass is a cost.
6. The date
Not "soon". A date. It determines the process as much as the quantity does, and a printer who knows the real date can tell you at quoting stage whether it is achievable.
7. Whether the copies differ
Variable data - names, numbering, outlet details - changes the process. It is the single detail most often left out of a brief and most likely to change the answer.
One more thing that helps
If you are reprinting something, send a physical sample. It answers most of the seven questions at once and it is the only reliable way to match colour on a repeat.
A template you can paste into an email
Item and format. Flat size and finished size. Quantity, plus one quantity above. Paper or substrate, or what it has to withstand. Colours, both sides or one. Finishing. Delivery date and address. Whether copies differ.
Eight lines. Send that to three printers and you will get three comparable numbers, which is the only way a comparison means anything.
Why 'send me your best price' is a bad opening
It invites the supplier to guess at the cheapest possible interpretation of your job, which is how you end up comparing a 130 gsm quote with a 170 gsm quote and choosing the wrong one.
Specify the job and let suppliers compete on the same thing.
What to do when you genuinely do not know the spec
Describe the job by what it has to do rather than by what it is made of - 'handed out at a trade show and carried home', 'stuck on a jerrycan that lives in a godown', 'posted in an envelope'.
A printer who works in that category will translate that into a specification and should be able to explain the choice. One who cannot is not the right supplier for it.
Ask for the assumptions in writing
Any quote rests on assumptions - stock, colours, finishing, whether artwork is print-ready. Asking for those to be stated turns a number into something you can hold a supplier to, and makes two quotes genuinely comparable.
