How to Maximize the Use of Fonts On Your Brochures

There is no absolute rule on the right way to use fonts in brochures. But, there are some accepted guidelines that will help you create a brochure that is more likely to stay on people’s kitchen tables rather than being thrown in the kitchen trash.

Font choice in brochures is super important – more important than the color scheme you choose, even. It’s right up there with photo choice. Why? A brochure that isn’t legible won’t be read. If you choose a curly font in small size, it’ll be hard to read. People won’t take the time or effort to try to read your brochure, so make it as easy on them as possible. Your choice of fonts and how you use multiple fonts can help.

Serif Text with a Sans Serif Headline
Serif text is almost always the better choice for body text in brochure printing. Serif fonts are the ones that have little “feet” or lines jutting out from the end of each letter. Examples: Times New Roman, Georgia. Sans Serif fonts, like Arial and Gill Sans, work better as headlines because headline text is larger and sans serif fonts are hard to read at small sizes.

Use Contrasting Styles
Using Serif and Sans Serif fonts for different elements is also recommended because similar typefaces don’t offer enough contrast and will therefore cause a visual clash. Using two script fonts for a headline and subheads won’t work because there isn’t enough of a difference for readers to tell which is a headline, and therefore a new subject, and which is a subhead.

Don’t Use Too Many Fonts
A lot of people are font happy. Just because their computer comes with 100 fonts, they feel as though they need to use each one in a single brochure. Fight this urge! Limit your number of fonts to three or four (two is actually preferred – one Serif and one Sans Serif) so that your brochure has a consistent look throughout. Changing from one font to another to another can make a brochure look like it’s from multiple companies instead of one company trying to forge a brand message.

Use Proportional Fonts
Avoid monospaced fonts for body copy. Monospace fonts are those where each letter takes up the same amount of space as another. Courier is the most common monospace font. Ever notice how an “i” takes up the same amount of space as an “m”? This is distracting to the eye in body text.

The Text Shouldn’t Blend in with the Background
Use dark text on a light background to ensure readability. You can use white on a black background, but it’s harder on the eyes when the background is darker than the text. Just make sure not to use a light color like yellow on a light background, like light green.

Font Resources
Sometimes you know what kind of look and feel you want your font to have, but you don’t know the specific font you want. To help you find that perfect font, use the Esperfonto Typeface Selection System. You can search for fonts on characteristics such as: Modern, Formal, Casual, Serious, Friendly, Sans Serif, Serif, etc.

To get some ideas for type palettes that work well together, check out the Type Palettes from Chuck Green. He’s got a lot of examples that will show you what headline and body fonts work best together.

Chuck Green’s type palettes are all examples of good design. Here are some bad design samples that you shouldn’t try to emulate.

This Bodoni-like display typeface used for text is set much too tight. Although Bodini is a wonderful typeface, and it’s a Serif, it’s too detailed to use as body type.

Here’s a bad use of Helvetica. The headline is squished together, artificially condensed and is too large for such a narrow column.

Everything about this is wrong. The lines way too long and there is no leading. Again, Helvetica is used with tight letterspacing that makes it hard to read. Plus it’s printed with blue and green ink on a light background. It’d be better if it were printed in black.