Both JY Ætna and JY Integrity are fonts that users of Vista Print can select to make their business cards.
   When I first found this out from my friend Dale, who uses Integrity on hers, I was quite chuffed. But then I thought: I don’t remember seeing Vista Print among our licensees.
   I am not accusing this company of piracy. Far from it. It could well have licensed the fonts legitimately for each location. I am simply curious which of our retailers the deal was done with, and whether everything’s above board. Maybe someone at the retailer end goofed. Maybe the fonts were part of a compilation. Maybe Vista is indeed among the client lists, but I missed that month’s report. Maybe we messed up on the wording of the licence that we provided to that particular retailer. It would be nice for everyone to put things right. This is just regular, everyday commerce. Any explanation is conceivable.
   If it is all above board, then I’d welcome the chance to promote the fact that JY&A Fonts’ products are good enough for Vista Print to use. I love the fact that they are being used in an online application.
   We win, they win, customers become aware of more choice.
   So I contacted Vista Print. I asked if we could do a joint promotion. And I asked about the licensing, just to be sure. How hard could it be, after all, to figure out where one purchased a couple of font licences from? And why not have the opportunity to promote yourself further?
   I appreciate this is an international company, but then I also know that the purchases would be centralized.
   It’s been a couple of months and I’ve heard nothing. I’ve also heard from a colleague that he’s been trying to find out the same thing—for a year.
   Vista Print, your silence has me worried, and you already have some unhappy customers.
   Fast forward to this week. I mentioned Vista Print on Twitter. One of my Twitter contacts mentioned she wasn’t a customer, but she gets their spam. (I did, too, and in French—the same company or a licensee? Sadly, I’ve deleted them all, so I can’t back this up.)
   And Vista Print itself has a Twitter account. In fact, they Tweeted me, asking if they could be of service:



   I said they could and asked for a contact address (presumably via private messaging) so we could chat through the above.
   And what did I receive via private messaging?
   Spam, entitling me to 25 per cent off.



   At the moment, these chaps aren’t putting a single foot right. Posted by Jack Yan, 07:58  permalink

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