Name cards are more than a simple piece of card holding your contact information; they are an opportunity to improve your branding and show your company's commitment to quality. 

A business card's design can raise your company above the competition and make your business the one which comes to mind when people think about a product or service they need. When you are researching your design options, you should consider the concept of vertical name cards, rather than the traditional horizontal style. 

How does a horizontal versus vertical name card's design stack up in the eyes of the customer? Does it inspire them to pick up the phone or fire off an email, or should you stick to traditional designs? Does it even matter?

Unfortunately, there's no hard data on whether a vertical business card will yield better results than a horizontal one. With no indication about performance in the marketplace, you are free to decide on your own whether a vertical design will suit your purposes. Here are a few pros and cons we came up with to help you decide:

Advantages of a Vertical Business Card Design

A vertical business card's design will make an impression. Most card designs are horizontal because it's familiar, and people are used to it. Even when different materials are used (like chocolate, metal, rubber, and fabric), you will see even the most creative uses of material in horizontal designs. 

Of course, you have probably seen more vertical card designs than chocolate or metal business cards, but when you stack them up against the more common horizontal design, it's the vertical card that will get the second look. In short, a vertical card is a cost-effective way to create a design that stands apart from the crowd. 

Using strange and exotic materials in a business card design will significantly ramp up the cost of printing. However, a vertical business card, printed on standard stock, will not cost any more than a run-of-the-mill horizontal card. If you plan on handing out thousands of cards every quarter, you will want to keep your printing costs under control by not printing on chocolate, metal, or rubber. 

The Downside to Vertical Business Card Design

There's not much bad to say about vertical business card design. It's affordable and just different enough to make you stand out. However, if you are taking on the design process yourself and are not a professional graphic designer, you may have given yourself a more significant design challenge than you at first thought. 

Most non-professional designers will resort to using templates to kick their creative processes into gear. If you're creating a traditional horizontal card, then you have thousands, if not millions, of ready-made template designs from which to choose. Vertical designs don't get so much attention in the business card template world, so you will get fewer options from which to choose. 

The other issue is that you have less width to work with, as you are now trying to fit a message across 55mm of a card, rather than the usual 90mm. It's a small problem, but it may be a challenge if you have a lengthier tagline than usual or need to make room for a logo and contact details. 

In the end, the choice of whether you choose a more traditional horizontal design or go vertical is entirely up to you. There's no data to say one way or the other, which is better, so you should focus on the message, and what you want your name card's design to say about your organization.