For producers
Packaging & product branding
Labels, bottles, cans and boxes, designed for the one moment that matters: a shelf, at arm's length, next to everyone else.
Packaging is the only design job where you can watch it fail in real time. A label either gets picked up or it does not, and the reasons are usually structural: the name is too small, the range all looks the same, or the shelf is a wall of the same colour and yours is one more.
So I design the range as a system rather than three separate labels. One thing changes between flavours, everything else holds, and the result reads as a family from three feet away. Legal requirements are designed in from the first sketch rather than squeezed on at the end, because retrofitting an ingredients panel is what wrecks a good label.
- Suits
- Food, drink and craft producers, from a first product to a full range
- Timeline
- Four to ten weeks, depending on the number of lines
- Also covers
- Regulatory layout, printer liaison, artwork for a range extension
- Note
- I check the labelling rules that apply, but a compliance review is your responsibility
What's included
Everything that makes it work.
The range as a system
One label, with a defined set of things that move between variants. It is what makes three products look like one brand on a shelf.
Front and back
Both faces designed together. Ingredients, nutrition, allergens, weights, barcode and recycling marks all planned in, not squeezed in.
Shelf testing
Checked at the size and distance it will actually be seen, against the competitors it will actually sit beside.
Made for the printer
Correct dieline, bleed, colour space and finish. Set up so your printer quotes rather than queries.
Illustration where it earns it
Drawn artwork rather than stock, when the product needs a character of its own.
The wider brand
Crates, cases, point of sale, and the campaign artwork that has to work on a wall as well as a bottle.
What gets handed over
Yours, properly.
Everything below is yours on completion, including the source files. No licence to renew, and nothing that stops you working with someone else next time.
- Print-ready artwork per SKU, to your printer's specification
- Dielines and a packed proof PDF for sign-off
- Colour breakdowns for the substrate and finish you are using
- A specification sheet covering what moves between variants and what never does
- Mockups for listings, press and social
- Editable source files for adding a flavour later
Related work
Where this has gone before.
Questions
The things people actually ask.
Do you handle the legal bits on a label?
I design them in properly: ingredients, allergens in the right emphasis, nutrition panel, net quantity, alcohol strength where it applies, recycling marks and the barcode. What I do not do is sign off compliance. Rules change and the liability sits with the producer, so I lay it out correctly and recommend you have it checked.
Can you work with my existing printer?
Yes, and I would rather. They know their press, and building to their specification from the start avoids the round of surprises that usually happens at artwork stage.
What if I want to add a flavour later?
The system is designed for it. Because the range is built as one label with a defined set of variables, a new variant is usually a small job rather than a redesign.
Do you do the photography too?
I produce mockups for listings and social, which is enough for most launches. For proper product photography I will point you at someone good rather than pretend it is my trade.
Also from the studio
Got a product that deserves to be picked up?
Tell me what you are working on. No pitch, no jargon, just a conversation about whether I am the right person for it.