Tiny Type for Product Inserts

[Nancy Allison]

Hello. I proofread product inserts for one of the big pharmaceutical companies. They used a very thin, very tough paper, but they didn't skimp on point size. It was probably a condensed Arial, say 9 point. 

I believe the page was 11 by 17", and when folded tightly by some kind of machine, it folded up to a very small size. Yet, when open, it was legible. 

I never tested the paper with oil or any other substance, but at least with the larger pt. size, you'd have a better chance of reading the type even if it is blurred.

Sorry I don't have the exact specifications, but anyway, that's what they did. (The inserts contained the same info repeated in about 8 languages, fyi).

--Nancy

>From: jopakent at comcast.net
>Date: 2007/02/27 Tue PM 01:00:35 CST
>To: techwr-l at lists.techwr-l.com
>Subject: Tiny Type for Product Inserts

>Greetings Whirlers,
>
>My client manufactures clinical diagnostic equipment and has for years distributed lengthy product inserts (PIs) that describe the FDA recognized capabilities of the product. The current product inserts are 20-25 letter size pages set in 10' type. They need me to reduce them to as small (miniature) as possible. 
>
>I've been tasked with re-purposing these inserts so that they can more closely resemble the PIs that are distributed by pharmaceutical product representatives. When these reps visit a physician, they hand out some kind of branded sample (a pen or a mug or refrigerator magnet with the drug name on it). Attached to that sample is a tiny, tiny PI (not sure how small, my contact suggested 4.5 point type, not sure if that was accurate), The PI is printed on very thin paper (so thin that too much oil on your fingers renders it illegible) to facilitate portability. From what I understand, these tiny PIs are physically glued to the branded sample.
>
>I'm wondering about font sizes, page sizes, layout ideas, that kind of thing.  I'd rather avoid re-inventing the wheel (since as always, they want it  yesterday), or spinning my wheels unnecessarily. I haven't seen an example yet of what they're talking about, but they said they'd try to run one down to send me.
>
>So, has anybody out there ever worked on producing something like this? (Yesterday's humorous watch documentation comes to mind) I've not seen one of these yet (the client is going to try to find one to send me). Any information at this point would be tremendously helpful. I haven't even figured out what to Google at this point.
>
>Thanks in advance,
>--
>J. Paul Kent
>206-383-0539
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