First things First
Define Your Business
Physical packaging can be a huge resource to enhance your customers’ overall experience with your company. If done correctly, your physical packaging will be key in your customers’ overall impression of your company while providing a first-class unboxing experience.
Custom packaging can greatly enhance your brand while telling your company story and improving customer loyalty. However, organizing, designing, and ordering custom packaging can be difficult. There are many different options available in custom printed solutions. Your 3PL should have existing relationships that allow you to access price breaks.
Elevate Fulfillment works closely with each client to provide a cost-effective solution for all custom packaging needs. There are custom print options to choose from including corrugated mailers, printed mailer envelopes, rigid envelopes, poly mailers, and custom box sizes.
The Following Are Different Types Of Printing Options
Flexographic Printing
Flexographic printing is the most common form of custom box printing. The way it works is much like a rubber stamp on a large scale – a printing plate with your box’s design acts as a large ink pad that spins on a rotary drum, picking up ink and then stamping it onto your corrugated box.
- Related Costs: Flexographic printing requires a printing plate to be created. This is the custom rubber stamp used to stamp your design onto your subscription box. Prices vary, but you can expect to spend around $1,000 per plate. You’ll need a unique plate for each color, so if you use 4 colors on your box, you would need 4 printing plates.
- Minimums: Due to the machinery involved in flexographic printing, most manufacturers require about 1,000 box minimums for each run.
Digital Printing
Digital printing is more common for smaller sized orders. Digital printing is similar to your standard laser jet printer you might use at home. The machine mixes the inks and directly applies the color and design to the box.
- Related Costs: Digital printing is generally 3 to 5 times more expensive than flexographic printing on a small scale. While there are tools that allow for large runs, it’s generally easier and more cost-effective to transition to flexographic printing.
- Minimums: Digital printing requires much smaller minimums, with the caveat that the costs are much more expensive.
Litho Label Printing
Litho label printing (short for “lithographic”) provides a much cleaner, higher resolution print that functions a bit like wall paper. Unlike printing that occurs on the physical box, litho label printing is printed onto a paper sheet, processed, cut, and then attached to the box through a form of adhesive. When an entire box is covered in a litho label, it’s called a ‘full label,’ whereas a partial covering of the box is referred to as a ‘spot label.’
- Related Costs: Litho label printing is generally more expensive than flexographic printing, but starts to be competitively priced around the 3,000 to 5,000 box mark. At that quantity, litho labels may just be a bit more expensive than traditional flexographic printing, while offering a much cleaner, higher resolution product.
- Minimums: Minimums with litho label printing are more flexible than flexographic printing, but the costs are higher than flexographic printing.
Understanding The Process Of
On Brand Design
Choosing a perfect packaging size is the next step in the process. Size isn’t just important for the contents of your box either; it plays a large role in shipping. For example, if you’re using USPS cubic shipping rates, the dimensions of your box can greatly affect the pricing tiers your box falls into.
Elevate Fulfillment works closely with each customer to identify the most cost effective packaging to help save on shipping rates. This is important to analyze so shippers can strategically size your box to decrease shipping costs. In a recent survey of fulfillment pricing, FulfillmentCompanies.net found that shipping discounts can have a significant effect on profitability, especially considering that shipping costs represent such a large percentage of total warehousing and fulfillment costs. Elevate will analyze each parcel and ensure the most effective size is used to help save on dimensional shipping costs with FedEx, UPS, or USPS. Additionally, be sure to work with your 3PL to ensure international packages are shipped with the appropriate packaging to ensure minimal customs interference.
