Being St. Kilda football supporters, we are writing this post with some trepidation, reticence and reluctance, 
but write it we must. This is because we have been more or less inundated with picture framing request for the the picture framing of the 2023 Collingwood Premiership prints and posters. We have seen and framed different print versions, including the Herald Sun newspaper, as well as various Limited Edition formats. However, and by far the most common print that Customers want framed is the popular and inexpensive Mark Day 64x45 cm Premiership Poster edition. With this in mind we will explore the most popular and cost effective, picture framing options for this art, with the costs given below, current at the time of writing this post:
Option 1) $35.65 . This DYO method is the cheapest option to frame the print. The Customer buys one of our ready-made, 50×70 cm Black Wood Box Poster Frame. He or she then inserts the poster inside the frame, floats it and attaches it in the centre with some double-sided tape, or glue dots, closes the frame at the back , and the frame is ready to be hung.
Please note that these are off-the-shelf, poster frames, ready-made for the Customers to put the art in themselves. Importantly, this manner of picture framing is only recommended for inexpensive, common, commercial, open-edition prints and not for signed, numbered, limited editions or valuable versions. A free or paid fitting-up service for these frames is not available. A typical representation is shown below:
Option 2) $77 ( less 10% if Cash ) This custom framing option is the second cheapest to frame the print. The poster is glued down to an MDF backing with a plain, 2x2 cm, black wood black picture frame around it and, without any glass. This saves money, and, besides, not everyone wants glazing with their picture frames. With this option we do all the work, the Customer only has to drop of the print off to us and pick it up when it's framed and finished.
An important point when custom framing a print in this way, is that the print gets glued down, ( see post about wet-mounting ) meaning that it will stay permanently flat thus looking perfectly smooth under the glass. Often, if a print is left loose and unmounted, it can cockle, buckle and become wavy under the glass. That being said the custom framed print would look like the same as the one below:
Option 3 ) $92 ( less 10% if Cash ) This custom framing option is the same as the one above, but with clear float glass added for visual enhancement and protection of the framed art. The addition of glazing, being most frequently clear float glass, or, sometimes, the more expensive non-reflective glass, helps to protect the framed art from hits, knocks fumes, spillages and other hazards. It also does tend to make the framed art, more elegant. A mocked-up image ( Photoshop glass reflections effects are tortuous, to put it mildly ) is shown below:
Option 4 ) $154 ( less 10% if Cash ) This custom framing option is the same as the one above, but with a grey ( it can be any available colour ) window mat added. This not only makes the art larger and more prominent, as illustrated below:
Option 5) $189 ( less 10% if Cash ) This last custom picture framing option is the same as the preceding one but with the addition of a second, black window mat underneath the grey one. This combination is called a double-matted custom picture frame because that art is framed with two window mats. This is the most elegant of all the options listed here and it is well suited to a more formal environment, perhaps one such a professional office, business suites, or a boardroom.
While on the subject of Customers' DYO ready-made framing, or professional custom picture framing, it should be kept in mind that these particular, open-edition, mass-produced, commercial prints, are inexpensive and printed on common, industrial, acidic, newsprint. This means that the print itself will yellow, stiffen and embrittle with time, not matter how well it is framed.
We could, of course, suggest to Customers acid-free or conservation custom picture framing but we think this would be over-selling the task at hand because of the inherent instability and fragility of acidic newsprint which, more or less tends to crack, split and fall apart in a few years even if untouched and inside a frame.
Generally speaking, it's horses for courses, and if a print is a limited edition, or signed, or autographed, or unique or valuable to the Customer in any way, then, yes better custom picture framing methods and materials are certainly warranted, though these will add to the cost of the more inexpensive methods detailed thus far.
A penultimate point to touch upon is that all custom picture framing options are Customer Collect or Store Pick-up. That means that Customers may post or drop of their artwork to us but are required to collect the frames themselves when ready. The reason for this is that shipping Customers' custom frames is inherently risky.
Transit incident and accidents occasionally occur with any all Couriers and the risk of of damage or loss is always real and present. With custom picture framing, Customers sometimes commission art to be framed which has personal, sentimental, emotional, historical or financial value.
If this art were to be lost or damaged while being transported, we could be liable, and it is simply not practicable, nor affordable, to buy transit insurance cover for this type of risk. We researched this option a some times ago and quickly realized that the time and cost involved to disparately insure each and ever custom frame to be shipped cost would be unaffordable.
And perhaps a very last point to mention is that of discounts. With just about every custom picture framing job we get we are able to offer a 10% Cash payment discount off the Taxable Invoice that is issued. We can do this for custom frames but not for our other ready-made or off-the-shelf frames. The reason for this is simple.
There's just a little more profit in the the former that in the latter. For those seeking to delve deeper into this subject, the quandary, if not the predicament, of discounting is discussed in greater detail in the post "I need lots of photo frames and picture frames, what picture frames discounts can you give me? .