Custom packaging is one of the few places where a small brand can outclass a much larger competitor, because the unboxing is entirely within your control. It is also easy to overspend on before you have the volume to justify it.
Start with the cheap wins
Custom boxes carry real minimums and real per-unit costs. Before you get there, three items deliver most of the perceived upgrade for very little money:
- Branded packing tape. It turns a plain brown box into your box, and it costs little more than plain tape.
- Printed tissue paper. Wrapping the product inside a stock box changes the entire opening experience.
- A product insert card. A well-designed thank you card with a reorder code costs cents and is the only piece of packaging that directly drives revenue.
If you are shipping under a few hundred orders a month, those three items plus a stock kraft box will get you 80% of the way to looking like a considered brand, at roughly 10% of the cost of custom boxes.
Mailer boxes
The folded-wing shipping box that has become the default for direct to consumer. Structurally sturdy, no tape required to close, and it can print inside as well as out. An interior print is inexpensive theatre that lands at exactly the moment attention is highest.
Poly and bubble mailers
For soft goods such as apparel, poly mailers weigh almost nothing, which matters because shipping is priced on weight and dimension. Printed poly mailers are cheaper per unit than boxes and often the smarter choice for a clothing brand.
Bubble mailers add cushioning for small fragile items. Rigid mailers keep prints and documents flat.
Retail packaging
If your product sits on a shelf, the job changes from unboxing to standing out at arm's length.
- Folding cartons: die-cut printed boxes for retail shelves.
- Hang tags: for apparel and soft goods, in standard, folded, die-cut and foil.
- Header cards: fold-over cards stapled to a polybagged product.
- Packaging sleeves: printed bands that slide over a plain box, cheaper than printing the box itself.
- Shrink sleeves: full 360 degree wrap that conforms to bottle contours.
Dielines
A dieline is the flat template showing where a box is cut, folded and glued. Your artwork is built on top of it. If you do not have one, give us the product dimensions and we will supply a dieline to design against.
Two rules: keep critical artwork away from fold lines, because a fold through your logo will crack the ink; and remember that panels which are adjacent on the flat sheet may not be adjacent on the assembled box. Always check the 3D mockup, not just the flat file.
Always order a sample
We produce a physical sample before any full packaging run. This is not upselling. A box that looks correct on screen can be wrong in the hand: the proportions read differently, a color shifts on kraft board, a panel you thought was hidden turns out to be the first thing seen. A sample costs a fraction of a production run that has to be scrapped.
Materials
- SBS: bright white coated board, best color reproduction, the premium retail choice.
- Kraft: uncoated brown, natural and recyclable positioning. Printing on it shifts color, so proof it.
- Corrugated: fluted board for shipping strength, in single or double wall.
See the full range on our labels and packaging page.
Need this printed? We are on Hillside Avenue in Jamaica, Queens.