I fell in love with tri-fold brochures when I was a small child. My Dad flew a lot on business, going to places like Washington, DC, Chicago and Minneapolis. My mother and I would see him off and pick him up at the Birmingham Municipal Airport. There was a small terminal with desks for Delta, Eastern and Southern Airlines. There was also a big display for brochures for exotic places. I was allowed to pick up new brochures with each visit. In time I had enough brochures to fill my little blue trunk (that was supposed to contain doll clothes) with trifolds. I had beautiful full color brochures in my collection. I would play travel agent with my little friends. I wish I still had those brochures, but my mother disposed of them when I was in college.
So why are trifold brochures going the way of the dinosaur? There are lots of reasons.
- Trifolds are basically an 8 ½” x 11” piece of paper precisely folded into thirds. You can’t fold on the web, so when posted they are viewed with the panels in the wrong order. Viewing on the web is problematic.
- Printing out a trifold from the web has its own set of challenges. Most people have ink-jet printers, and these printers will not print out to the edge of the paper. This means a small white border will be around both sides of the sheet of paper. Also ink-jet printers are known for slippage. This almost guarantees that the folds will be “off.” When the registration (alignment) is not right, the brochure instantly looks amateurish. Putting a trifold on the web for downloading and printing compromises brand integrity very significantly.
- High-volume, low-cost printers also have problems with trifolds. While the printing is good, the folding is often off.
- Web based, easy to use graphic design programs are best for simpler projects, but they can be used for trifolds. They have the same level of sophistication as professional grade software.
- Trifold brochures are often created with full bleeds (ink extends to the edge of the paper.) To get the printing aligned properly, skilled designers use printer’s marks. These marks, however, are of no use and in the way of a conventional copier. For a quality digital press or conventional press, these marks are essential.
- In the pre-home computer era, trifolds were everywhere, and they looked great. The reason is that only professional graphic designers had the skill set to create them; only professional printers had the equipment to print them properly.
While it is possible today to create and print an amazing looking trifold, it requires professional level design and printing. The best trifolds are printed on 80 lb. or 100 lb. text weight paper. Sometimes, a heavier weight is desired. If a trifold is printed on heavier weight (110 lb. or 10-point or 12-point cover weight paper) the process will require scoring to keep the fold from cracking. For most trifolds 100 lb. text weight is ideal in either glossy or matte finish. If you are using saturated colors, a varnish or other coating is desirable to keep color from coming off onto the hands of the reader.
There are, however, now great alternatives to the trifold. For downloading from the web, the standard is the 8½” x 11” flyer (can be one or two sided.) It can tolerate a small white border. This format is very forgiving and most any weight paper will do. A rack card is another good alternative. It can fit in a rack designed for trifolds, and high volume, low-cost printers can do a great job with printing rack cards very inexpensively.
This is a case where increased accessibility to tools without specialized training in how to use them, and low-price points, and low-end digital printing have come together to compromise quality. The result is that the trifold is not a great alternative in 2026 – unless you have the resources to do it correctly and you don’t want to post it on the web.
