Every business has to market and come up with new ideas to stay visible. It can get overwhelming fast with a lot of moving parts and channels to keep up with and a lot of other businesses competing for the same attention. The thing is people do notice and appreciate good marketing. With the market being so oversaturated, it helps to find something that’s going to stick around and catch people’s attention instead of scrolling by and going away in a few seconds.

There’s one marketing piece that’s underused and underappreciated and doesn’t disappear right away. It’s a calendar. Promotional wall calendars are a piece of marketing that’s also helpful to your customer, generating close to 850 impressions over their lifetime. That’s the biggest sell. Sure your customer sees it every day but the real reason they keep it in the first place is because it serves a purpose for them. The best marketing is something that’s actually useful to your customer. A calendar hangs on a wall or sits on a desk for a full year and whatever is printed on it get seen almost every single day. That’s where your business shines.

Calendar season ends up creeping fast, especially if it’s your first time creating one. Here are some things to know when starting your promotional calendar project and how to design an effective one for your business.

What are Promotional Wall Calendars?

A promotional calendar is a self-branded calendar a business or organization gives to their customers, prospects, employees, or the community to keep their company top of mind all year

Businesses use them in two ways:

• To raise money through ad space sold to other local businesses
• To promote products and services

Either way, a promotional calendar pays itself off by showing off your business year-round. PrintingCenterUSA prints promotional calendars in both wall and desk formats. Get an instant quote here.

Types of Promotional Calendars by Industry

Promotional calendars work across nearly every industry, including:

Advertising, agriculture and farming, automotive and auto parts, boat dealers, child care, chiropractic, clothing, construction, conventions, dental, energy and environment, financial services, fishing and tackle, food and beverage, graphic design, health and beauty, insurance, legal services, real estate, retail, technology, travel and tourism, weddings and events, diet planning, medical and healthcare, and menu planning.

Steps to Designing Your Promotional Calendar

Designing a promotional calendar sounds like a lot. It’s really not, once you break it down. There’s a handful of decisions you have to make, that’s it. Once you know what they are, the whole thing moves fast.

Here’s the order:

1. Choose your theme
2. Choose your images
3. Design your layout and grid
4. Add any extra features
5. Get it printed!

Go in that order. Don’t skip ahead. Theme comes first because it drives everything else. You can’t pick your images for a calendar that doesn’t have a direction yet.

Choose Your Theme

First things first, decide what you want to feature in the calendar. Do you want it to be purely business-orientated? Do you want it to feature fun photos? What are your customers going to enjoy the most? Think about putting out a survey or maybe even a contest with your employees or customers to get ideas going instead of coming up with something on your own. If possible, try not to use stock photos. Just think about if you want to feature your own business or if you want something different.

Here are some creative themes relating to business:

• Product spotlight: show off a different one of your products or services each month with a nice photo at the core of it.
• Community spotlight: take different photos around the city that you’re in with the location.
• Customer spotlight: reach out to different customers and tell your other customers about who they are and what they do. You can also include their social media, LinkedIn, or their own website to feature them, get them going, and create a community within your own customers.
• Animal theme: reach out to a local shelter and take pictures of their animals, or collect photos from your employees or even your customers. People love looking at animals.
• Inspirational quotes: Give everyone a mantra or motto to go help get through the month
• Original art: Reach out to a local artist or photographer and see if they would like to feature some of their work in your calendar.
• Behind-the-scenes: Share photos of your employees at different events or working. People like seeing the process, not just the finished product.

Choosing Your Calendar Photos

Now that you have your theme down, that decides what images go in and how they’re laid out. You’ll need one photo per month, so a 12-month calendar needs 12 photos, plus a cover shot. Every photo should be 300 DPI. Some photos still print okay at 150 DPI. It depends, but ultimately, a calendar with blurry images isn’t going to hold up well.

Skip stock photos when you can. Customers can usually tell, and it doesn’t do much to make them want to hang it up on their wall.

Tip: Use our free file review to check your photos before you finalize your design. Upload your files and we’ll run a 43 point inspection and flag anything that’s low-resolution.

Calendar Layout and Grid

Your photos are done. The next stop is figuring out the layout and the grid underneath the photos.

A classic wall calendar splits the page in half. Your photo is at the top, and the grid is on the bottom with the month and the date boxes. That’s what most people picture. It’s usually where designers trip up because they’re not sure how to get started with this part.

The easiest way to get started is by finding a template. PrintingCenterUSA has free calendar templates for Adobe with four different grid options to choose from, already sized and formatted, or you can use PrintingCenterUSA’s free online design tool. Either way, you’re not building the grid from scratch. You can just drop in your photos, add any custom dates you want, take off any public holidays, and customize as you go. If you’d rather design in Canva, we have a free template with the print-ready requirements built out so you can just go in and customize. Start designing it now.

The grid is also where your logo and business information go. Most calendars keep this on the bottom margin of each grid so it doesn’t compete with the photo. It’s usually on every month so your business shows up the same way each time. It should have your business name, logo, phone number, and website. Keep it simple and to the essentials.

If you’re building a fundraiser calendar, this is also where your ad space lives. A sponsor ad typically lives on that same bottom half of the grid, right where your own business information would go. Your business usually stays on the front and back cover, and your sponsor ads run throughout the calendar grid. You can flip-flop that setup depending on what you want to prioritize. PrintingCenterUSA has two different templates that give you dedicated ad space and business space built into the layout, so you’re not squeezing sponsor logos in wherever they happen to fit.

Adding Fun Features to the Calendar

There’s plenty of room to add extra features to the calendar, and you can ultimately do stuff that shows a little personality as well.

Add industry-relevant holidays to the grid. Search for industry holidays that might be relevant to your business, there’s usually a few worth including. Add real dates to the grid too, consider a launch date for something, a sale, a company holiday, or maybe you give an exclusive promo. Add it right onto the grid. A QR code works well here too, so customers don’t have to type in your business, it can go straight to a featured product or your social accounts.

A traditional 12-month wall calendar typically has 28 pages, but only 12 of those are tied to a month. You’ll find that PrintingCenterUSA’s templates and design tool include two extra filler pages at the back. Instead of using those as-is, consider adding your own stuff in there, that’s a spot where you can get creative. If you’re running a fundraising calendar, that’s a natural spot for donation instructions or a sponsor thank you. For a standard promotional calendar, it could hold a welcome message, extended offers, more detailed information on the products, or just contact info, maybe even a little sales sheet or more information on the artwork you supplied.

Print Your Promotional Wall Calendar

A good promotional calendar comes down to a clear goal, strong photos, and a format that fits how your customer will actually use it.

Your design’s done. Now it’s time to get your print options figured out. Head over to our Complete Guide to Custom Calendar Printing for the full rundown on paper, binding, and sizing, everything you need to know about calendars before you order. Here’s an inside look at our calendar printing options!

PrintingCenterUSA’s been printing custom calendars for businesses, nonprofits, schools, and organizations for more than 50 years. Every order gets a proof before it goes to print, so nothing ships until you’ve actually approved it. Real support to help you every step of a way, give our friendly support team a call at 800-995-1555 for guidance. And it’s not just a one-time thing, businesses come back year after year for the same calendar, which is usually the best sign of all.

“I’ve had my calendars made by Printing Center USA for over five years now and am always impressed with the quality I get for the price. They do a wonderful job of making out affordable but also top notch as far as presenting my work to others.”- Sarah C. Read more reviews here.

Ready to order? Get an instant quote or upload your finished design to get started!

FAQ

What are promotional calendars?
Promotional calendars are branded calendars businesses give to customers or prospects to keep the company visible all year. PrintingCenterUSA prints them as wall or desk calendars with space for a logo, photos, and messaging.

What businesses give away free promotional calendars?
Businesses across nearly every industry use free promotional calendars as a marketing tool, from real estate agents and dentists to insurance agencies and retailers. They’re handed out to customers or clients as a low-cost way to stay visible all year.

What’s an example of a promotional calendar?
A common example is a wall calendar with a business logo on the cover, a product or lifestyle photo for each month, and space for a to-do list or promo code. Desk calendars follow the same idea in a smaller, single-focus format.

Where can I buy discounted calendars?
Pricing on promotional calendars usually comes down to order quantity, page count, and paper stock rather than discount codes. PrintingCenterUSA’s instant quoting tool shows real-time bulk pricing, so businesses can compare costs before ordering.

What stores give free calendars?
Some banks, insurance agencies, and local retailers give away calendars as a customer thank-you, usually printed through a promotional products vendor like PrintingCenterUSA rather than sold in stores.

How much does it cost to get a custom calendar made?
Pricing on promotional calendars usually comes down to order quantity, page count, paper stock, and binding. PrintingCenterUSA’s instant quoting tool shows real-time pricing so you can compare costs before ordering.

Can I put my logo on a promotional calendar?
Yes, your logo is one of the essentials. Most calendars keep it on the bottom margin of each month’s grid, alongside your business name, phone number, and website, so it stays consistent without competing with your photos.

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