The multi-colour wall calendar that turns a page each month — Regular, Great and Giant trade sizes, 12, 6, 4 or 3 printed sheets over a stiff backing card, offset-printed from 500 pieces.
In short
A monthly calendar is a multi-sheeter wall calendar — usually a 12-sheeter, one leaf per month — on 80–130 GSM art paper over a 250–300 GSM backing card. From a Sivakasi press the minimum order is 500 pieces, in sizes from Regular 11×17 in to Giant 14×40 in, with a 12–18 day lead time.
Reviewed 28 October 2026 · trade sizes, GSM options and hanging rates re-checked each August before the calendar season
Every row is multi-colour offset on art paper, trimmed to a Sivakasi trade size and mounted on a backing card for hanging.
| Sheeter | Trade size & inches | Leaves | Art-paper GSM | Backing card | Usual buyer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12-sheeterone month per leaf | Regular 11×17 in | 12 + cover | 80–130 | 250–300 | Design-led corporates |
| 12-sheeterDay-Month grid | Day-Month 15×20 in | 12 | 80–130 | 250–300 | Banks, retailers |
| 6-sheetertwo months per leaf | Great 14×24 in | 6 | 100–130 | 250–300 | Distributors, wholesalers |
| 4-sheeterthree months per leaf | Giant 14×40 in | 4 | 100–130 | 300 | Volume gifting |
| 3-sheeterfour months per leaf | 20×30 in | 3 | 100–130 | 300 | Shops, hotels, clinics |
| Monthly tear-offsingle-mount pad | 11×18 / 17×27 in | 12 tear leaves | 80–100 | 300 | Households, temples |
A daily wall calendar on one sheet is the cheapest thing a Sivakasi press makes — IndiaMART lists a Tamil daily 10×15 in at ₹25 a piece and a plain daily wall calendar at ₹15, and iPrintZone quotes ₹32 for a 10×15 daily. A monthly sheeter costs more than any of those because it is not one sheet: it is up to twelve printed leaves plus a 250–300 GSM backing card, each leaf a separate pass of the offset work. Plain offset runs ₹1–2 a printed page and a heavy multi-colour sheet can reach ₹45, so a 12-sheeter's price is driven by how many leaves, at what GSM, in how many colours. We publish the spec, not a single headline number, because a monthly calendar quoted without its sheet count tells you nothing.
The format a brand chooses when the calendar is a design surface. Twelve full-bleed images, a dedicated grid per month, and eleven page-turns that each re-expose the logo. It carries the most art paper and the most make-ready, so it sits at the top of the monthly price band.
Half the leaves, most of the presence. A distributor gifting thousands of shopfronts wants a calendar people keep on the wall all year without paying for twelve images. Printed on 100–130 GSM art paper so the sheet does not curl once it is six months deep on the nail.
Four big leaves, typically on the Giant 14×40 in long format that dominates a shop wall. The volume-gift workhorse: low leaf count keeps the piece price down while the sheer size keeps the brand visible from across a room. Backing card steps up to 300 GSM to hold the length.
Three leaves covering the year in quarters, usually at 20×30 in. The most economical multi-sheeter: fewest leaves, least binding, but still a page to turn so it reads as a proper calendar rather than a static poster. Common for clinics, hotels and quick-service counters.
A monthly wall calendar is read, not just hung, so the dates and festival marks have to be in the buyer's language and the buyer's faith. We set the twelve grids in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Hindi or English, and build the religious edition the region expects — a Hindu panchangam with tithi and muhurtham marks, a Christian calendar with the liturgical feasts, or a Muslim calendar tracking the Hijri months alongside the Gregorian grid. Sivakasi has printed every one of these for decades, which is why a buyer in Kerala, Karnataka or the Hindi belt can source a correctly-marked regional calendar from the same cluster that prints roughly 30% of India's diaries. Supply the date and festival data, or name the panchangam you follow, and our prepress lays the grid; you approve the dates on the proof before plates are made.
The three wall-and-desk formats a Sivakasi press makes answer three different gifting problems. A daily sheet calendar — 365 tear-off leaves on a single mount — is a household object, cheap at ₹15–25 a piece, and it is read every morning for the panchangam. A monthly sheeter is a slower, more designed object: it shows a full month at a glance, gives you twelve branded images instead of a tear-off pad, and it suits a buyer who wants the calendar to look considered on an office or shop wall rather than purely functional in a kitchen.
Against a desk calendar, the monthly wall sheeter wins on reach and loses on dwell time. A 13-sheeter desk calendar sits in front of one person; a 12-sheeter wall calendar is seen by everyone who walks past the wall, which is why a retailer gifting footfall, a co-operative bank gifting account holders, or a distributor gifting shopfronts reaches for the monthly wall format. The usual corporate split we quote between August and November is a desk calendar for the named-account list and a monthly wall sheeter for the broad list, printed in one production window so there is a single make-ready, one dispatch and one invoice.
The decision that actually moves the price is the sheet count, not the format name. A 12-sheeter and a 3-sheeter can carry the same brand and hang in the same shop; the 12-sheeter simply costs more because it is four times the printed paper and four times the leaves to collate and rim. If the brief is reach on a budget, the 4 or 6-sheeter on a large trade size is almost always the right answer, and we will say so before you commit to twelve leaves you do not need.
Send these and the proof comes back in one round; the month grids are the part buyers most often get wrong.
| Item | Requirement | Common mistake |
|---|---|---|
| File format | Print-ready PDF/X, or layered AI, CDR or PSD, one artboard per leaf | A single flattened image for all twelve months |
| Resolution | Images at 300 dpi at the placed trade size | Web-resolution photos scaled up to 14×40 in and visibly soft |
| Colour | CMYK throughout, with any Pantone spot named in the file | RGB holiday reds that shift on conversion at the press |
| Bleed | 3 mm bleed on all four sides of every leaf | Artwork built to the trim line, forcing a white edge |
| Rim allowance | Clear 12–15 mm at the head and foot where the tin rim crimps | Grids and logos run into the crimp line and get cut |
| Date grid | Supplied and checked by you — tithi, festivals and holidays for the region | Assuming the press owns the panchangam; we set it, you approve it |
| Language fonts | Tamil, Telugu and Devanagari outlined or embedded | Live regional fonts that re-flow on a different machine |
A monthly sheet calendar is a multi-leaf wall calendar that shows one month — or two, three or four months — per leaf, rather than the whole year on a single sheet. The common build is a 12-sheeter: twelve month leaves plus a cover, printed on 80–130 GSM art paper and mounted on a 250–300 GSM backing card for hanging.
Five hundred pieces from an offset press. Below 500 the plates, make-ready and tin-rim setup are a large share of the piece price and a digital shop is cheaper. Some Sivakasi presses quote a MOQ as low as 100, but that economics only works on a single-leaf calendar, not a 12-sheeter with twelve separate passes of work.
It is budget against presence. A 12-sheeter gives one branded image a month and sits at the top of the price band; a 6-sheeter halves the leaves for most of the wall life; a 4-sheeter on the Giant 14×40 in format maximises size for volume gifting; a 3-sheeter is the cheapest multi-sheeter at four months a leaf.
The month leaves print on 80–130 GSM art paper and the backing card runs 250–300 GSM. Go to 100–130 GSM on a 6 or 4-sheeter that stays on the wall all year so the sheet does not curl, and keep the backing at 300 GSM for the long Giant format, which needs the extra stiffness to hang straight.
The Sivakasi trade sizes: Regular 11×17 in, Day-Month 15×20 in, Great 14×24 in and Giant 14×40 in, plus the standard monthly sheet sizes 11×18, 17×27 and 20×30 in. We trim to the size the format needs — a 4-sheeter usually goes Giant, a 3-sheeter 20×30 in, a design-led 12-sheeter Regular or Day-Month.
Yes. We set the twelve grids in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Hindi or English and build the religious edition the region expects — Hindu panchangam with tithi and muhurtham marks, Christian liturgical feasts, or a Muslim Hijri-and-Gregorian grid. Supply or name the panchangam data and you approve every date on the proof before plates are cut.
Most 12 and 6-sheeters take a crimped tin (metal) rim top and bottom, which also protects the flipped leaves. A centre-hole eyelet suits a single-nail hang, and the long Giant 14×40 in format usually needs a hanger rope or two fixing points. Spiral binding at the head is a premium alternative to the tin rim.
Twelve to eighteen days from approved artwork and advance, the same window as our other calendar formats. A 12-sheeter sits at the longer end because every leaf is a separate collation step, and the season between August and November is busy — booking before the rush keeps you nearer the 12-day end than the 18.
Trade size, 12/6/4/3 sheets, GSM and language. Someone who has stood at the calendar press replies within 1 working day — WhatsApp or email, in Tamil, English or Hindi.