Pricing · September 14, 2026 · By Hardik, Owner — East Coast Blueprints

Seven ways to cut your firm's plan printing bill, with the dollar amount on each

A small firm prints a few hundred large-format sheets a month. None of these tactics is dramatic on its own, but together they’re the difference between printing being a rounding error and printing being a line item someone has to manage. Each one comes with the number.

1. Stop printing plan sets at a big-box counter

The biggest one by far. FedEx Office is $6.99 per ARCH D sheet; Staples about $4.50; online specialists $1.75–$2.00. A firm printing 300 ARCH D sheets a month is spending about $2,100 at FedEx Office, $1,350 at Staples, or about $540 with us after volume discount.

Saves: $800–$1,500 a month for a 300-sheet firm, plus the trips.

2. Get every line item over 25 sheets

Our volume discount is 10% on any line item (sheets × sets) of 25 or more. A 24-sheet set, two copies, is 48 sheets and qualifies. A 12-sheet set, two copies, is 24 and doesn’t — but three copies is 36 and does, so the third copy costs $16.80 instead of $24.

Saves: 10% on the print, and often a third copy you’d have wanted anyway.

3. Get the order over $100

Shipping is $15 under $100 and free over. A 24-sheet set alone is $48 + $15 = $63. Add the half-size set for the owner (24 × $0.75 = $18) and the two spare copies of the site plan and you’re over $100 and the shipping disappears.

Saves: $15 per order, which on 2–3 orders a week is $1,500–$2,300 a year.

4. Split the color sheets into their own line item

Color is $6.00 per ARCH D sheet; B&W is $2.00. A 24-sheet set sent as one color PDF is $144. The same set with the four actual color sheets split into a separate color line item is $64.

Saves: $80 per set, more on multiple copies.

5. Half-size for everyone who doesn’t need to scale off the sheet

Subs pricing a bid, owners reviewing, the office file: ARCH B 12×18 at $0.75 instead of ARCH D at $2.00. Five extra sets of a 24-sheet job are $90 half-size versus $240 full-size (both before discount).

Saves: $150 per five-set batch.

6. Fold selectively

Accordion folding is $0.50 a sheet. Fold what’s going to a permit desk or riding in a truck door. Roll what’s going on a plan table or a trailer wall. On a three-copy set where only the permit copies need folding, fold two and roll one.

Saves: $12 per set on a 24-sheet set, and the rolled set is easier to work from anyway.

7. Save the file and reorder instead of re-uploading

Not a direct cost saver, but the reprints you avoid are. When the file lives in your account, the field-set replacement is a two-minute reorder rather than a “just run to FedEx” decision at $6.99 a sheet. A 30-sheet field set reordered is $69 delivered next day; the same set at a counter on the way to the site is $209.70.

Saves: ~$140 per emergency reprint.

The compound effect

Take a firm doing two permit submissions and one bid distribution a month, plus reprints, at a big-box counter: roughly $2,100–$2,400 a month. Move it online and apply tactics 2 through 6: about $600–$650 a month. That’s the number worth putting in front of whoever pays the bills.

And one thing not to do

Don’t cut copies. Two permit copies when the construction office wants three means a rejected submission and a second round of printing and shipping. Ask the office, print what they want, and save the money on the other six items instead.

Every figure here is worked through in more detail on the pricing questions page.

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