Vendor Review - Print Divas and PrintedMatter

I admit it was partly my fault. But I think it is a vendor's responsibility to be clear about their product and services to avoid any misconception about the end result.

I wanted to visit Print Diva's office so I can see their products but since they're located in Pasig, it was difficult for us to visit coming from Laguna/Cavite. I managed to see QP and Printedmatter in Glorietta. QP is nice and elegant but their designs are a bit traditional and outdated. Printedmatter was one of the other vendors I have shortlisted and I did see their samples and liked them.

I can't remember anymore what prompted me to choose Print Divas. Maybe it's their cheaper cost and nice examples. Or maybe it's the free stickers. Since I saw the materials from Printedmatter and QP, I figured all vendors must be using the same materials so I went ahead and chose Print Divas for my invitations. What a bad decision it turned out to be.

Don't get me wrong. Their designs are nice. But it's the material that I was not happy about. The end product of my first invitation looked so cheap that I knew I cannot give this away. There goes my money down the drain.

The papers used for my invitation is almost the same as the paper of my desk calendar that I bought in National bookstore. If I knew it will end up like this, I could have done it myself and not pay that much. The free envelope stickers were printed in matte adhesive paper that you can buy from National bookstore. The design was not nice and the end result is again not good enough. The design for the label was also without my input so it was not something I liked.

Printdivas created my missalette too. For this purpose, the paper is just okay so I can use them for the wedding. Thank God for small blessings, 'no? At least, it was not a total loss.

Printedmatter allows a mock-up of your invitation so you get a picture of what you will get. There are additional cost though but overall, I am happier with their product and I'm glad I got them to help me with my final invitation.

One lesson I learned about the Print Divas mistake is that I need to make time to visit my vendors and not just rely on what I see in the internet. So with my other vendors, I took the time to talk to them and work out the details so that I get what I asked for. No more surprises.

Here's my rating for the two vendors using a rating range of 1 - 10 with 10 being the highest:

Details	Print Divas	Printed Matter
Design	6	8
Materials	1	8
Mockup	0	8
Price	8	8
Time to complete	4	8
Value for money	0	10