Event flyers

Grand opening flyers

The flyer that works has a reason to walk in on it. The one that does not says "grand opening" in large letters and leaves it there.

A neat stack of printed cards on warm linen

A grand opening flyer has a narrow job: convert somebody who walks past or receives a leaflet into a person who comes through the door on a specific day. That is a conversion problem, not an announcement problem, and it is why the most common version of this flyer underperforms. A large logo, the word CELEBRATION, and a date is an announcement. It gives a stranger nothing to act on.

What gives them something to act on is a concrete reason and a low-friction one. Free coffee for the first fifty, twenty percent off everything on the day, a free class, a raffle for something local people would actually want. The offer does not have to be expensive; it has to be specific enough to picture. Then the address has to be findable, which for a new business means naming the cross street or the neighbouring business, because nobody knows your unit number yet.

The second thing a grand opening flyer should do is outlive the day. Most get thrown away on the way home. Putting the opening hours and a QR code to your booking page or menu on it turns the flyer into something worth keeping on a fridge, which is where the second visit comes from.

Flyer design

$125

Flat, for one flyer designed for your event. Print-ready PDF tested in black and white, an email version, and square and story sizes. One round of revisions, back in four days.

Start one

How it gets seen

Where this flyer actually lands

Handed out on the street nearby, dropped through local letterboxes, put up in neighbouring businesses, and posted in community and neighbourhood groups. Almost all of it is local within a mile, which is why the address block matters more than any brand element on the page.

Design notes

What changes for this one

The offer is the largest element after the business name. Address is set with a landmark or cross street, not just a number. Opening hours and a QR code sit at the base so the flyer keeps working after the day. Colour and type should match the shopfront, since people arriving are matching what they saw to what they see.

What it has to carry

The offer, stated concretely, with any limits ("first fifty", "on the day only")
The date and the hours of the opening event
Address with a cross street or landmark
Regular opening hours, for after the event
One way to follow up: QR code to the menu, the booking page or the social account

What goes wrong

The mistakes worth avoiding

Making the logo the largest thing on a flyer for a business nobody has heard of yet.
Announcing an opening with no reason to attend on the day.
Giving a unit number with no landmark, for an address nobody can picture.
Leaving out normal opening hours, so the flyer is worthless from the following morning.
Using a design that looks nothing like the shopfront, so arrivals are not sure they found the right place.

Questions people ask

Do you design logos too?

No. This studio designs invitations, announcements and event paper, and a logo is a different discipline with a different process. Bring the logo you have and the flyer will be built around it.

What sizes work best for handing out?

A half sheet or a postcard size, because a full sheet gets folded and binned. You get both, plus the square and story versions for posting.

Can you include a QR code?

Yes, to your booking page, menu or profile, sized to scan reliably from a photo rather than sized to fit a gap.

How far ahead should it go out?

Two weeks of local distribution before the day, with a reminder push in the last three days. Earlier than that and a stranger has forgotten by the time it arrives.

Demand

1,000

US searches a month for grand opening flyers, measured rather than guessed.