Custom Printed Stand Up Pouches can be an intimidating process for anyone, not just the beginner. Consider these 5 steps in order to communicate with your supplier with the end result being award winning custom printed Stand Up Pouches.

 

 

As the different titles suggest, they flush out various details regarding the custom printed process, for your particular needs.  All of this information allows your packaging professional to provide you with different options at different price points.  Step one; we discussed the items you were packaging.  Step two; we looked at the finer points of what you were trying to accomplish with these custom printed stand up pouches.  Step three; we explained the Artwork Guidelines to bring us up to where we are at right now.  Step four is titled Do You Agree?

 

Printed Stand Up Pouches – Step Four –Do You Agree

 

At this particular point in the custom printed stand up pouch process, it’s all about making decisions and double checking those decisions.  Part of the apprehension for most clients is the dreaded, “How will my artwork look on a printed stand up pouch?”  Many clients will see artwork on a computer monitor or even printed on a piece of paper and assume, which can be dangerous, that the colors will be identical.  Once the main details of a printed stand up pouch are agreed upon, such as the text, bar code, sizing, and ziplock and tear notch placement, and finally the colors to be used, an electronic proof is provided to the client.   Unfortunately everyone’s computer monitor is generally set differently; meaning how a certain color looks on my monitor could look radically different than what it looks like on your screen. 

 

Further complicating things is the fact that most customers will then print out the electronic proof and review the colors off of a standard desktop color printer.  If your artwork includes for example a Pantone PMS 285 Red, it could look excellent on a computer monitor, and now once it is printed on a white piece of copy paper it looks different.  Making things even worse, most likely the printed stand up pouch you want isn’t white at all, it is clear film that is printed several colors but has a clear window.  This means that clear film will be used, and what you really need to see is how that Pantone PMS 285 Red looks when printed on clear film.  Yikes, no wonder why this can be a scary process!

 

Unfortunately, the custom printed stand up pouch world doesn’t have published books like the paint companies do when you want to see what a Sherwin Williams certain color looks like before you buy it at Home Depot or Lowes.  However, consider these steps and you can accomplish the same thing and have amazing results.

 

Once you’ve reviewed your artwork with your supplier and just as important gone over all the other details about your project such as the size, the material structure you will use, how many you’ll need, the pricing, etc, place your order to get things going.  The first thing your supplier should do is create your printing cylinders; these are the metal rollers that will hold the ink.  Each color of your artwork needs a cylinder. 

 

Have your stand up pouch supplier make a “knock off” or “film proof” using the exact colors you’ve specified on your artwork on either a clear structure (if your pouch will be printed on clear film) or on an opaque structure if your finished pouch will be opaque, like foil for instance.  At this point, consider having your supplier take a photo and email that to you or you can even have the entire film proof sent to you for your review.  Note, these film proofs are very flimsy and are not meant to mimic a final product, only to give you a very good look at what your colors will be like when complete.  The main difference between a film proof that is emailed as a photo or physically sent for you to touch and feel is the timing.  It is much faster to review an email photo than wait for the actual sample.

 

Keep in mind, if anything is off or doesn't look right, you can have your supplier try another color and repeat the process again.  Don’t forget, this is not to diminish the importance of having the correct material structure, the size, or the features such a ziplocks and hang holes in the right spot.  Most clients get stuck is the printing process and we believe these little tricks can help you end up with amazing printed stand up pouches that will allow you to compete with the Big Boys in your industry.  Always rely on your packaging professional for guidance and direction.