Product Designer Feature Checklist for a Print Store Launch

What should a product designer do before a print store launches?

A product designer should let a customer finish a printable design on any product in the store, on a phone or a laptop, and hand the print shop a print-ready file with the order. Before launch, that means checking 25 features in five groups: product set-up, customer tools, preview and price, output files, and package limits.

An online product designer is the browser editor on the product page where customers personalise a print product; that article explains how it works from product page to print file. This checklist is the test plan that follows: what to try in the designer of your own store, why each item matters, and what a pass looks like. It works for any designer, and the notes below say where a Printcart full store covers an item by default.

How do you run the checklist?

Run the checklist as a customer would, on your own store, before you announce the launch. Pick one product from each product family, test on a laptop and on a phone, and finish with a real test order for each product. An item passes only when the result is right in the downloaded print file, not just in the preview on screen.

1. Pick three to five test products, one per family: for example a business card, a T-shirt, a mug and a poster. The Printcart setup guide on www.printcart.com recommends proving the flow on one representative product per family before rolling it out.
2. Test on two devices. Use a phone, or a desktop browser switched to a phone model in its device mode; a narrow desktop window is not the same, because the shop decides what is a phone from the browser type.
3. Write down each result in the CSV of the checklist below: pass, fail or not needed for that product.
4. Place a test order per product and download its file from the order, then open the file at full size.
5. Fix and retest every failed item before launch, and keep the CSV as the record of what was tested.

Which checks matter most for which product?

The checks that matter most depend on the product, because each product family fails in its own way. Business cards fail on bleed and small text, apparel on print area and colour, photo products on resolution, and brand templates on locked fields. Run all 25 items once, then repeat the ones in the table below every time you add a product of that family.

The custom T-shirt product page checklist covers apparel in more depth, from the product photos to the order, and the guide to selling personalised products with custom text covers the text tools for gifts and stationery.

Which items come with each Printcart package?

Every Printcart full store package includes the online product designer on the product page, premium templates, cliparts and fonts, 3D and canvas edge previews, and print-ready files with every order. The packages differ in limits: how many products show the designer, how many order files you download a month and how much storage designs get.

Embed this graphic

Copy this HTML to show the graphic on your site with a link to the source.

<a href="https://solution.printcart.com/insight/product-designer-feature-checklist"><img src="https://solution.printcart.com/insight/product-designer-feature-checklist/package-matrix.webp" alt="Matrix of designer features in the Store, Store B2B and Marketplace, and Enterprise packages of Printcart" width="1440" height="1080"></a><br>Source: <a href="https://solution.printcart.com/insight/product-designer-feature-checklist">Printcart</a>

Three items of the checklist depend on the package rather than on set-up. Products with the designer live are 100 on Store, 1,000 on Store B2B and Store Marketplace, and no limit on Enterprise; you switch the designer on per product. Order file downloads, the customer uploads and personalised order files you download from your dashboard, are 500 a month, 5,000 a month or no limit, and cloud storage for designs and order files is 5 GB, 50 GB or 200 GB. Customers are never blocked by these limits: they can always buy, upload and request quotes; the limits apply to what the shop sees and downloads.

Two items need more than the Store package. A brand media and template library, which keeps each business client's media and templates ready for its orders, comes with Store B2B, Store Marketplace and Enterprise. Serving the designer and design assets from your own domain comes with Enterprise.

What fails most often in a launch test?

Three failures cause most reprints of personalised products: low-resolution uploads, text that does not fit the print area, and a preview that does not match the produced file. The Printcart setup guide on www.printcart.com names the same three. Each one is caught by the checklist, but only when the test goes all the way to the downloaded file.

• Low-resolution uploads. A photo that looks sharp on a phone screen can be far too small for a poster. A resolution warning at upload, item 10, lets the customer choose a better photo before ordering; the DPI article explains the numbers.
• Text outside the print area. Long names and messages overflow small products. Print areas and safe zones, items 1 and 2, keep text inside; capping the text length on templates helps too.
• Preview and file disagree. Fonts that are not embedded, colours that shift from RGB to CMYK, or a missing bleed only show in the file. Items 20 and 21 catch them; the file formats article explains what to ask for.

What should you do when an item fails?

When an item fails, decide whether the fix is a setting, a template or a missing feature. Most failures are settings: a print area drawn too large, an upload rule not set, a template without bleed. Fix those per product and retest.

A price check that fails, item 17, often means the product needs another pricing model; the comparison of instant price, price matrix and quote shows which one fits. A missing feature is different: it needs another package, an app, or custom work on the designer.

For settings and templates, the Printcart team sets up your first 10, 30 or 50 products in the first year, depending on the package, and builds template packs and clipart libraries as a quoted design service. For features the designer lacks, such as a special tool for one product family, custom development on the Printcart designer is quoted before work starts. When the gap is the starting point rather than a tool, the comparison of templates, customer upload and blank canvas helps choose the flow per product.