YOU NEED TO KNOW AND UNDERSTAND WHAT BLEED IS if you are designing either a business card, flyer, brochure, or postcard for print.

It amazes me how even the most experienced designers have no concept of what it is and how to use it!

FIRST, please understand this:
MOST COMMERCIAL AND DESKTOP PRINTERS WILL NOT PRINT ALL THE WAY TO THE EDGE OF A SHEET OF PAPER! 

Below is a horrible illustration of a printer gripping and printing:

Although the illustration is of a small desktop printer, large production presses work much in the same way.

“Well what if I want a background color or image to extend all the way to the edge?” you ask?

If you design a full page, 8.5″ by 11″ flyer, with a tree covering the entire background, and you try to print it, it will end up looking something like this (blue is comments added by me):

So how do I print a full page?

Printing companies break the solution down into 2 steps:

1. 1) Design and print LARGER than the end product
2. 2) TRIM the extra down to the desired size

Here is a diagram:

It is important to note now that TRIM IS NEVER EXACT! For this reason, keep any important wording or images AWAY from the trim line!!!!!!! Usually a quarter of an inch in from the trim line is safe.  This is called “safety” which you might have heard about.

If you have a good understanding of bleed, and implement it into your designs before sending your design jobs off to the printer, you can save yourself a lot of time, by not having to redesign, and a possibly a lot of money, because some printing companies charge to set up your artwork if not done so properly the first time.