How to Get Five Printer Quotes From a Single RFQ Instead of Phoning Round All Day

You need five quotes on a print job by end of play, and you're staring at a phone, a spreadsheet, and a growing sense of dread. Ringing round printers one by one, leaving voicemails, re-explaining the spec every time — it's how most of a working day disappears when a client wants pricing yesterday.

There's a faster way, and it doesn't involve giving up margin to an aggregator or web-to-print middleman. It starts with writing one properly structured RFQ and putting it in front of multiple printers at the same time.

Why phoning round is the slowest possible way to price print

On the surface, calling three or four printers you know feels efficient. In practice, it isn't. You end up:

• Repeating the same spec five times to five estimators
• Chasing callbacks that arrive after your client deadline
• Getting quotes back on different bases (some inc. delivery, some not, some assuming 150gsm, some 170gsm)
• Missing capacity because your usual printer is booked and you didn't know until Wednesday
• Never quite knowing whether you got the best price or just the first price

Even if you're a seasoned print broker with a decent rolodex, phoning round caps you at whoever picks up. And if you're a marketing manager, event organiser or sole trader placing print occasionally, you probably don't have a rolodex at all — just Google and a lot of patience.

Write the RFQ once, properly, and never again

The single biggest time-saver in print procurement isn't a piece of software. It's writing one clean RFQ that a printer can quote from without ringing you back with questions. If your brief is tight, quotes come back fast and comparable. If it's vague, you'll get five wildly different numbers and no way to judge them.

What a quote-ready print RFQ actually contains

1. Product — flyer, brochure, saddle-stitched booklet, folding carton, roll-up banner, DTG t-shirt, etc.
2. Quantity — and any break points you'd like priced (e.g. 500 / 1,000 / 2,500)
3. Size — flat and finished, plus bleed if artwork is ready
4. Stock — GSM, uncoated/silk/gloss, or a named stock if it matters
5. Colours — 4/4 CMYK, 4/0, plus any Pantone specials
6. Finishing — lamination, foiling, die-cutting, embossing, folding, binding
7. Process preference — litho, digital, wide-format, or "printer's choice"
8. Delivery — location, deadline, split deliveries if relevant
9. Artwork status — supplied print-ready, needs makeready checks, or design still in progress

Get those nine things down once and you can paste the same brief into any RFQ platform, email, or portal without rewriting.

Send one RFQ to many printers at once

This is where a marketplace beats a phone. On ZeozGig, you post the RFQ once (£1 flat, and if nobody quotes, you get that £1 back automatically). Printers and finishers who work in your category see it and respond with their own numbers. You're not paying a percentage of the job. You're not handing over commission. You're just publishing a request and letting suppliers come to you.

A few practical things that make this work in the real world:

• Multiple quotes arrive in parallel, not in series. You're not waiting for Printer A to call back before Printer B looks at the job.
• Specialist kit finds you. If you need foiling, die-cutting, wide-format or DTG, printers with that specific capability self-select in. You don't need to know who owns which press.
• Local capacity surfaces. Printers near your delivery point can price sharper on carriage and often turn faster.
• Direct chat, no middleman. When a quote looks right, you open a direct connection for a small fixed fee (£5) and talk to the printer yourself — chat, voice or video. Whatever you agree, you keep 100% of the margin. ZeozGig doesn't take a cut of the deal.

Comparing five quotes without getting confused

Once quotes land, resist the urge to just pick the cheapest. A £40 gap on a £600 job can easily be a stock swap or a finishing shortcut. Line the quotes up against the original spec and check:

1. Are they quoting the exact GSM and finish you asked for?
2. Is delivery included, and to the right postcode?
3. What's the lead time from artwork approval?
4. Any Pantone or special-ink surcharges hidden in the small print?
5. VAT — inc or ex? (Sounds obvious. Catches people out weekly.)

A good RFQ platform makes this comparison quick because everyone is quoting against the same brief. A pile of phone-scribbled numbers on a notepad does not.

Who this works for

This approach isn't just for print brokers and print management companies. It works equally well for:

• Marketing agencies pricing a campaign without leaning on one favoured printer
• In-house procurement teams benchmarking their incumbent supplier
• Event organisers needing signage, lanyards and programmes on a tight run-up
• Startups and sole traders ordering their first proper run of packaging or business collateral
• Artists and small brands commissioning giclée prints, zines or short-run merch

The common thread: you want competitive pricing without a day on the phone, and you don't want to hand a chunk of your budget to an aggregator that's simply reselling someone else's press time with a mark-up.

Post one request, get real quotes back

If your next print job needs pricing today rather than Friday, post an RFQ on ZeozGig for £1. Multiple printers and finishers will quote against your spec, you connect directly with the ones you like, and there's no commission on whatever you agree. Zero responses? Your £1 comes back. If you're on the other side — a trade printer or finisher with capacity to fill — list your capability and let the RFQs come to you.