Trello can be much more than a task list in a print shop

When we think about Trello, we usually think about organization: tasks to do, tasks in progress and completed tasks.

But there is a way to use it that I find particularly interesting for people who work in a print shop: turning the board into a production workflow.

I use Trello this way with one of my clients, and over time I realized that it solves a common problem when several people take part in preparing a job—especially when they do not all work in the same place.

Imagine a print shop with an in-house designer, two freelance professionals and someone responsible for color separation. These people may be in different cities or even different countries.

Instead of information being scattered across emails, messages and separately transferred files, each job can have its own card.

That is where it starts to become interesting.

The board follows the job

In my case, the board contains the different stages of production.

A job may begin among the received files, move through analysis and pre-production, reach the print-ready artwork stage and finally enter the production queue.

The card simply moves forward with the job.

This means that when someone opens the board, there is no need to ask: “What stage is this artwork at?”

The card’s position already answers much of that question.

A specific column can also be created for a particular professional or role. When a job reaches that column, it is clear who needs to handle the next stage.

For teams working remotely, this is very useful.

The most useful part is inside the card

For me, however, the main advantage is not simply moving cards from one column to another.

It is the history kept inside them.

The order information, references, measurements, notes, links, comments between the people involved and changes made during the process can all remain there.

In my color-separation work, for example, I can receive artwork, make the separation and then attach the final file to the same card.

The context remains with the file.

A specific change can be recorded, and an important production note stays associated with that job.

Months later, someone can reopen the card and understand what happened.

This avoids the familiar situation of finding several similar files in a folder and trying to work out which one was actually used in production.

It does not need to be a complicated system

That may be what I like most about using Trello this way.

It does not need to replace every system in a company.

The idea is much simpler: it can act as a bridge between design, pre-production and production.

A designer finishes a stage and sends the job forward. The pre-production professional receives it, does the work and records what was done. The job then moves to the person who will produce it.

Everyone sees the same workflow.

Because the history follows the card, a conversation about a particular job does not have to disappear inside a messaging app.

A familiar tool used in a different way

Trello was not created specifically for screen printing, and perhaps that is why many people do not think of it in this way.

Simple tools can become very useful when they are adapted to the way we actually work.

If you work with a design team, outside professionals or people responsible for different stages before printing, it may be worth trying.

Start small.

Create a few stages that represent the real path of a job through your company and let one order move through that flow.

You may discover, as I did, that Trello can be far more useful to a print shop than a simple list of things to do.