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How to calculate print cost: the lines of a print quote

A print quote is the sum of a few simple calculations: how many sheets, how many kilos of paper, how many plates, how many impressions. Quotes rarely go wrong in the arithmetic — they go wrong when a line is forgotten. Here are the lines one by one, with worked numbers.

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The lines of a quote

The cost of an offset job almost always comes from the same lines:

  • Paper — the sheet count including waste, by weight.
  • Plates — one per colour per side.
  • Make-ready — a fixed job paid once per plate set.
  • Printing — sheets times passes through the press.
  • Finishing — cutting, folding, lamination, varnish, binding, as the job needs.
  • Margin and VAT — the step from cost to the customer's price.

1. Sheet count

Everything starts from the sheet count: quantity ÷ pieces per sheet, rounded up, plus waste. Working out pieces per sheet after the gripper and bleed is covered in a separate guide.

Example: 9 A5 flyers fit on a 50 × 70 sheet. 5,000 flyers need 556 sheets; with make-ready and running waste, call it 600 sheets.

2. Paper: from square metres to kilos

Paper is bought by weight, so the sheet count has to become a weight: the sheet's area (m²) × grammage (g/m²) gives the weight of one sheet in grams.

  • 50 × 70 cm = 0.35 m².
  • 115 gsm coated: 0.35 × 115 = 40.25 g per sheet.
  • 600 sheets × 40.25 g = 24,150 g, about 24.2 kg of paper.
  • Paper cost = 24.2 kg × the paper's price per kilo.

3. Plates and make-ready

Offset needs a plate for every colour. Four colours on one side (4/0) is four plates; both sides (4/4) sheetwise is eight. Printed work-and-turn — front and back on one plate set — the same 4/4 job needs four plates, and each sheet yields two copies.

Make-ready — mounting plates, bringing up colour and register — happens once per plate set and doesn't depend on the quantity. Plates and make-ready together are the fixed part of the quote.

4. Impressions

Impressions are sheets times passes through the press. On a four-colour press, 600 sheets printed 4/4 sheetwise go through twice: 1,200 impressions. On a perfector, which prints both sides in one pass, the same job is 600. The shop prices printing from this number, at its own hourly or per-thousand rate.

Why the unit price drops with quantity

Plates and make-ready are fixed; paper and printing grow with the run. With example figures: a fixed part of 100 units, and 0.03 units of paper and printing per piece.

  • 1,000 pieces: 100 + 30 = 130 units, 0.13 per piece.
  • 5,000 pieces: 100 + 150 = 250 units, 0.05 per piece.
  • Five times the quantity doesn't even double the total — which is why quoting a few quantities side by side works so well.

5. Waste

Waste comes from two places: sheets run while colour and register come up during make-ready, and sheets spoiled during the run. Cutting, folding and lamination add their own. The allowance depends on the press, the number of colours and the job; every shop has its own figures, and they belong in the calculation from the start, not guessed on at the end.

Digital is costed differently

A digital press has no plates and no classic make-ready; the cost is mostly counted in clicks — per printed side. That makes digital cheap for short runs; as the quantity grows, offset's fixed cost is spread over more pieces and offset pulls ahead. Where the two cross is different in every shop, so working out both side by side shows the right choice.

From cost to quote

Cost is the shop's own number; the customer's price adds the margin and VAT on top. Writing the terms next to the price heads off arguments later:

  • How long the quote is valid — paper prices move.
  • What the price includes: delivery, proofs, design.
  • How the file must be supplied, and with what bleed.
  • Delivery time and payment terms.

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