E-Commerce D2C Packaging is Red Hot!
After printing millions of boxes for thousands of customers for over a decade, we have watched a lot of trends in graphics come and ago. Some time ago, everyone wanted their boxes to show a bold eye-catching Chevron pattern, later came a flood of geometric designs. More recently, printing with icons in a scattered random repeat pattern has become popular.
What has remained consistent is the use of bright colors to grab the consumer’s attention as color has become an increasingly important part of everyone’s brand. That has in part been made possible by companies like ours who have become very proficient at printing flood coat colors directly on to corrugated board. (See this post for more info on flood coat colors)
Almost every color has had their turn in the limelight with yellows, purples, and greens all being the rage, for a while. Today, one of the hottest colors is the variety of reds as shown in the attached photos. Red is no longer just for Christmas or Valentine’s Day, it is a powerful color that communicates just about any message you want to send.
50 Shades of red?
As a kid you can probably remember the large Crayola box that included red-orange and well as orange-red. The difference was subtle but there was a difference. Red can also lean toward pink, orange to even purple hues. The fact is that as shown in the product grouping photo, you can make your red your own unique color. We can print a basic GCMI color or any Pantone (PMS) color you may want and make the color true as well as consistent! Your brand does not change from one shipment to another, and neither should the color of your boxes.
Add a matching or contrasting insert (plain white, Kraft, or custom printed) and you can create a great unboxing experience for your customers.
Beyond color for your e-commerce and subscription boxes
In many cases, the customer knows what color they want their boxes to be long before they meet with us. A color that ideally compliments and works with other color(s) in their logo and other graphics. We understand that color can be very emotional. After all, we are the company whose registered tag line is “packaging that communicates”. The questions that remain are usually; is it possible to use too much color, and whether you want to print it inside, outside or both?
Deciding between inside and/or outside print on your D2C box
What we usually suggest is that you think about your box, not as you ship it but what it looks like when it arrives at your customer. We are obviously great proponents of flood coat printing but not all colors hold up well through the shipping cycle. Pink and yellow come to mind but the same is true of most pastels. Keeping a box simple on the outside (like a natural Kraft exterior) may be a better choice than printing a color that shows every smudge, scratch, and fingerprint it suffers during shipment.
Keep in mind printing anything inside will likely add 20 to 30% to the cost, and of course, you also need to buy the one-time cost print plates. However, the inside of the box always arrives pristine, so graphics and colors always look great. Industry wide, we probably helped lead the charge for inside printing so not surprisingly, we do it better than most. If start up costs are an issue, and they usually are, please remember that inside printing can always be added later. Perhaps after you develop some volume and have a better idea of what it is you want to communicate on your box interior.
We have provided (related posts) links below to many great information resources on this and other related topics. You can also email us at Salazar Packaging or call us at 630-551-1700. We also invite you to visit our gallery which shows a small sampling of our work.
Related posts:
https://www.salazarpackaging.com/e-commerce-custom-box-printing-and-production-faq/
https://www.salazarpackaging.com/adding-inside-print-to-an-existing-subscription-or-e-commerce-box/
