It is that time of the year again and calendar publishers in HCM City are creating products with eye-catching designs as increasingly aware and affluent customers demand quality stuff.

As one of the country's leading calendar producers, the Vietnam Book Distribution Company (Fahasa) has been licensed to print 280,000 calendars in different patterns and sizes.

Fahasa and its competitors began preparations as early as in September to improve their designs for the Year of the Dragon after a volley of complaints that last year's calendars were jaded.

This year many have printed calendars featuring landscapes, traditional architecture, traditional pictures, children, and images from daily life.

Multi-sheet calendars featuring landscapes from Hanoi , Hue , Nha Trang, the coast, and highlands seem to be quite a hit with customers.

The Vietnam Record Books (Vietbooks) has unveiled a 365-page calendar featuring more than 200 national records and 150 portraits of record-holders.

"We expect to issue around 50,000 copies in September," said Le Tran Truong An, general director of Vietbooks.

"We hope the 2012 calendars please our customers," Nguyen Phu Loc, a calendar vendor in Nguyen Thi Minh Khai street , said.

"With all the new designs, even demanding customers will be able to find something suitable," he added.

According to the Viet Nam Publishing Association, some 17 million loose-leaf calendars published by State-owned companies will be sold in bookstores across the country and many will be sent to rural areas. /.