So you need vibrant, digitally printed labels, but before we get ahead of ourselves here’s how things work from here on in.
1. Quote & Order
You would have seen or spoken to a sales consultant at a printing company who suggested a size, material and finish for your label going forward. If you are happy with the price you will choose a quantity that suits your requirements and you place an order.
Handy hint: Prices are volume related, so the more you order the cheaper it gets!
2. Design
Before a label printing company can start printing they need to sort out your artwork.Option 1: They design a label to your specifications. For this, they need a design brief, which you will sit and cover with your consultant, think of this as a roadmap for the designer to work with, to get to exactly what you are looking for. If you have any images or logos, fonts etc this is when this will be specified. Of course, taste is a very personal thing so be as specific as you need. Rather too much information than too little. If you have labels that you’ve seen on a product or in sample packs, reference these and send them your ideas. Design is a slow and tedious process so give them a few days to send it back to you, of course, if you have many variants/SKU’s this will extend the process.
When you receive your design/s back take a careful look and request any changes, special attention should be paid to spelling and content such as ingredients, instructions and layout.
Option 2: You have existing artwork and would like this replicated, easy, but your printer needs it in a certain format to be able to get it print-ready. Because there are so many design packages on the market we’ve found that a High-Resolution PDF works best. Please make sure all Fonts are converted to Curves/Paths to avoid having Font substitution problems and incurring design charges.
Handy hint: Remember we make use of a CMYK print process, so if you have a specific Pantone colour you’d like to use ask the consultant to look at the colour chart for the best CMYK match. Digital and Flexo are vastly different print processes and there is certain colour we cannot match exactly.
3. Digital and physical proofs and approval
Once your printer has digital approval (this means you are happy with the electronic proof / design and acknowledge this on email), they move on to a physical proof. They schedule time on their press to produce a printed version of your design for final sign off of changes. To avoid delays this is normally on Semi-Gloss paper, which is our most common substrate. This is a unique offer because unlike many printers will give you a print produced on the actual press, not a desktop proofer. This simply means that what you see on the proof is what you’ll get as your final product. A point to note: The physical proof will be un-finished, this simply means that it will not be die-cut or have the varnish layer or lamination of the final product. If you are happy with the physical proof, you will sign it off and then they’re ready to roll.Handy hint: The design phase could take days or weeks, depending on how fast they can get you to a design you like.
4. Printing, Die-cutting and finishing, Rewinding
With all the approvals out of the way, they move to the production phase. Your order now gets planned, printed, finished and rewound.As you can see there are quite a few steps to get through before a printing company can start printing, so make sure you have sufficient stock from your existing supplier.
The good news is that once you’ve been through the initial artwork and approval phases, your job becomes a re-order. This simply means approved artwork is already in place and all you need to do is place an order for your labels at Asset Print, check the price and await delivery.
Article source: https://fromhelveticatoprint.weebly.com/blog/digitally-printed-labels
