Soft Touch Business Cards

Ultra-matte business cards with a velvety surface, suited to designs where a soft feel and restrained reflection matter.

Printing: CMYK HP Indigo printing Paper: Holmen Invercote Creato C2S Cover Laminate: TALENT SMARTSILK Soft Touch 1.4 mil Thickness: 18pt or 36pt.
Production: Typically 4–5 business days after artwork and proof approval.
Files: PDF only, set up in CMYK, with 1/8-inch bleed on all sides and crop marks.

About this product

Soft Touch Business Cards combine full-colour printing with an ultra-matte tactile laminate designed to produce a low-reflectance, velvety surface. Compared with conventional silk or gloss finishes, Soft Touch reduces surface glare and gives the printed sheet a distinctly softer, more tactile character.

The finish performs particularly well with dark backgrounds, restrained layouts, fine typography and designs where physical handling is part of the presentation. Because the laminate changes surface reflectance, printed colours may appear slightly deeper and more subdued than on an unlaminated press sheet.

Available in 18pt and 36pt constructions, the 18pt option provides a practical premium format while the 36pt stock offers substantially greater rigidity and edge depth. Round corners are available on the 18pt configuration.

Printed colour and the low-reflectance soft-touch surface.

Soft Touch Laminate Specifications

Surface: Ultra-matte soft-touch film laminate with very low surface reflectance and a smooth, velvety tactile response.

Stock Construction: Available in 18pt and 36pt finished thicknesses. The 18pt configuration provides a conventional premium card profile, while the 36pt construction offers substantially increased rigidity and edge depth.

Print Characteristics: Soft-touch lamination suppresses surface glare and reduces apparent highlight contrast, producing a dense, subdued visual character. It performs particularly well with typography, dark fields, restrained palettes and graphics where surface reflectance needs to be minimized.

Surface Behaviour: The laminate provides additional protection over the printed sheet against routine handling and minor abrasion. Because of its ultra-matte surface, fingerprints, oils and handling marks may become visible under certain lighting conditions, particularly on dark solid areas.

Finishing: 0.25" diameter round corners are available on the 18pt configuration. The 36pt construction is supplied with square corners unless otherwise specified.

Colour Behaviour: Soft-touch lamination can increase perceived density and reduce apparent brightness compared with the unlaminated press sheet. Dark colours may reproduce visually deeper, while subtle shadow detail and neutral tones can shift in appearance depending on lighting. Colour-critical work should be evaluated using an appropriate physical proof where necessary.

Prepress & Production Standards

Printing: Full-colour, double-sided production from supplied press-ready artwork, followed by soft-touch lamination and final converting.

Artwork: Supply a press-ready PDF in CMYK at final trim size, with 1/8-inch bleed on all sides and crop marks. Keep important text inside safe margins, embed or outline fonts, and use production-quality image resolution. Extremely fine rules, small reverses and critical edge-aligned elements should be prepared with normal commercial print tolerances in mind.

Colour: Set print artwork to CMYK before exporting the PDF. Identify any spot colours or colour-critical elements for production review.

Proofing: Digital PDF proofing is available for checking content, layout, trim position and general prepress accuracy. A PDF proof is not an exact representation of final colour, density, laminate appearance or tactile characteristics.

Trim & Finishing: Lamination, trimming and corner finishing are subject to normal commercial production tolerances. Designs incorporating narrow borders or elements positioned close to the trim edge should allow sufficient safety margin for converting variation.

Production Time: Typically 4–5 business days after artwork and proof approval. Additional finishing, colour review or production requirements may extend turnaround.