Some parents may be looking for easy ways to create customized gifts for their kids. One idea they’ve had for a while is to make a customized children’s book using Shutterfly’s print-on-demand services.
As a professional children’s book printing supplier, I wanted to help you find out: Can you actually create children’s books on Shutterfly? And if so, what’s the process like?
An Overview of Custom Books from Shutterfly
For starters, Shutterfly does offer custom children’s books in a few different sizes and styles.
You can choose board books with thick, durable pages for infants and toddlers. Or softcover and hardcover options with paper pages for older kids.
Some key details about Shutterfly’s selection of custom children’s books:
- Available in trim sizes ranging from 5×5 inches up to 8.5×8.5 inches
- Printed book pages range from 12 pages up to 44 pages
- Both landscape and portrait layout options
- Themes like animals, travel, family, and more
- Customize the text, fonts, colors, and images
So Shutterfly definitely provides the option to create children’s books. But how easy is the process of actually designing one?
Step-by-Step: Making a Custom Children’s Book on Shutterfly
To find out for myself, I gave Shutterfly’s online book builder a test run.
Specifically, I tried customizing both a board book (for babies/toddlers) and a standard softcover children’s book.
Here was my experience…
Choose Book Style and Layout
First, I selected “Custom Children’s Book” from the Prints & Gifts section of Shutterfly’s website.
This took me to a page with tabs for different book types, binding styles, sizes, and numbers of pages.
I first tried out one of the thick board books with 12 pages. After selecting my trim size and page count, I was able to preview the available layouts.
You can build your book using Shutterfly’s pre-designed page layout templates, or a completely blank canvas. I opted to start with the templates to make things easier.
Key Finding: Right off the bat, the process was super intuitive. I liked being able to visually preview the book styles and layout options before committing to anything.
Add Photos and Text
Next, I started personalizing my book by adding photos and text to the page layout templates.
Uploading photos from my computer was simple — they have an auto-flow feature that inserts images into your layout frames automatically.
The text editor was fairly robust, allowing me to customize fonts, colors, sizes, and positioning.
One thing I liked was the option to save your own custom text styles to easily apply consistent formatting across your book.
Key Finding: So far, customizing this children’s book was just as easy as designing a photo book or calendar in Shutterfly. Adding images and text was simple and straightforward.
Preview and Order My Book
When I was finished personalizing all the pages, I was able to view a realistic preview of how my book would look when printed.
I played around with switching themes, layouts, and orientations to see the differences.
Finally, when I was happy with my design, I just had to add it to my cart and go through the checkout process.
Key Finding: I loved that I could preview multiple book styles and layouts without having to start over each time. And the checkout process was smooth.
The Verdict: Yes, You Can Make Custom Children’s Books on Shutterfly!
Based on designing both a board book and softcover children’s book on Shutterfly, I can confirm that you absolutely can create custom children’s books through their print-on-demand platform.
The entire process — from selecting a book style to adding your own images and text to previewing — was really seamless and user-friendly.
Granted, it will still take some time to fully customize and personalize a 10, 20 or 30-page book.
But Shutterfly’s intuitive editor and ample design options make it fun and easy even for non-designers.
So if you’re looking for an easy way to create a one-of-a-kind, high-quality printed book for your kids or granchildren, I highly recommend giving Shutterfly’s custom children’s book printing services a try!
Let me know in the quotation if you have any other questions about designing children’s books on Shutterfly. I’m happy to help!