GAMES AND GADGETS

Because inkjet printers comes cheaper and cheaper, it's now easy to print your own postcards at home. However, before delving into your own DIY project try to think about whether it’s more costly to print your own postcards or if it would be easier to just order pre-made postcards from sites such as Vistaprint.com. If you need 50 or more postcards, doing it yourself will probably cost more than just ordering one since you have to take into consideration the price of the specialty paper plus the ink you’re going to use. VistaPrint’s postcards can cost around $30 for 100 prints which will bring your cost per postcard to around 30 cents. Some specialty paper would run you around $20 and does not even guarantee that it is enough for 100 postcards.

Plus, ordering and customizing your postcard is easy enough using VistaPrint’s online tools. However, if you’re bent on this DIY project, here are just the things to consider:

The first thing you need is a software where you can design your own postcards. If you have a copy of Windows Publisher with you, that's a good choice. Other free software can be found at download.com under desktop publishing. If you're making postcards for your children, then try Postcard Maker 1.1, it has cute templates though not recommended for business use.

Next is choose the paper that you want to use. Do you want to use specialty paper, stationery, colored paper, etc? If using colored paper, be sure that the template you have used will be visible, it’s not a good idea to print the same colored template and paper. Also, be sure that your inkjet printer supports that type of paper. Try to see the documentation that came with your printer.

After that, then you can just print away to your heart's desire. Or at least, until your budget permits you.