If you are a distributor, your own brand on the product is usually worth more than the margin on somebody else’s. This page is the practical detail: what it costs to start, what the minimums are, and what we need from your designer.
What can be branded
| Product | Print method | Colours | Minimum |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bin liners and refuse sacks | flexographic, on the sack | 1–4 | 500 kg per design and colour |
| Sack cases | flexographic, on kraft | 1–2 | 2 000 cases |
| Stretch film | printed core, printed film | 1–2 | 1 tonne |
500 kg of printed sacks is roughly 12 000–25 000 units depending on size and gauge. For a distributor moving a pallet a month, that is between six and eighteen months of stock on a first run — which is the real constraint, not the tooling cost.
What it costs to start
| Item | One-off | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Flexo plates, sacks | €180–420 per colour | reusable, held 3 years |
| Litho origination | €400–900 | per design |
| Colour matching to Pantone | €120 | per colour, per material |
| Pre-production sample | €150–300 | credited against the first order |
Plate cost is quoted separately and invoiced once. We do not amortise it silently into the unit price, because a hidden origination cost makes a repeat-order price look like an increase when it is actually the same price without the tooling.
Plates are held for three years from last use. Repeat runs carry no origination cost and a shorter lead time — two extra working days rather than five to eight.
Artwork
Formats: PDF/X-4, AI or EPS with outlined fonts. 300 dpi minimum for any raster element.
Colours: Pantone Solid Coated references, or CMYK with a printed reference you are happy to match. Polyethylene and kraft are not white, so a colour that looks correct on screen prints differently on each substrate — this is the single most common cause of a rejected first run.
Bleed: on sacks and film the print area is inset from the edge, because the web stretches during extrusion and registration cannot hold to the sealed edge. We send a die-line with the printable area marked.
What to leave room for: the recycling and material identification marks and the EN standard reference where one applies. We flag these on the proof so they are not discovered after the plates are cut.
What not to redesign yet. The harmonised PPWR sorting label is not a 2026 obligation. Article 12 sets it at 12 August 2028 or twenty-four months after the implementing acts that define the pictograms enter into force, whichever is later — and as of this review those acts have not been adopted, although they were due by August 2026. Until they exist, nobody can produce compliant artwork, because nobody knows what the pictograms look like. The obligation also does not reach transport packaging at all, which takes pallet wrap out of it entirely.
Two things that are real now: the standalone printed Green Dot stops being usable from 12 February 2027, and French placement still requires Triman and Info-tri while the Commission’s case against France runs. If you print for France, keep Triman on the artwork.
Timeline for a first private-label run
| Stage | Duration |
|---|---|
| Specification agreed | 1–2 days |
| Die-line issued to your designer | 1 day |
| Artwork supplied and checked | your side |
| Digital proof issued and approved | 2–3 days |
| Plates cut | 3–5 days |
| Production | 18–25 working days |
| Transit | 2–7 days |
Realistically six to eight weeks from first conversation to goods on your racking, of which the part you control is artwork approval.
Who is responsible for what
Private label moves the compliance obligation onto you. That is not a reason to avoid it — it is a reason to know it before the first pallet lands rather than after.
Two separate roles change hands, and supplier questionnaires routinely blur them:
PPWR manufacturer. Article 21: an operator who places packaging on the market under their own name or trademark is treated as the manufacturer, with the full Article 15 obligations — technical documentation, conformity assessment, and the EU Declaration of Conformity issued and signed in your name. Not the plant’s. A declaration naming the converter does not cover your brand.
EPR producer. Registration, reporting and fees in each member state where the packaging becomes waste. This follows national implementation, and the thresholds and deadlines differ by country. It is a separate exercise from the declaration, on a separate clock.
The Commission’s June 2026 guidance is worth one sentence of your attention: the roles are assigned per packaging and per market, not per company. You can be the manufacturer for your own-brand line and a plain distributor for the plant-brand line sitting next to it on the same pallet.
What we make sure you get from the plant, before the first run:
- the technical documentation to support the declaration you will sign, in a form you can actually file — not a one-page assurance letter
- material composition and recycled content statement
- packaging weights by material, per unit and per pallet, for your EPR returns
- a written commitment to reissue the documentation whenever the specification changes
The declaration itself is yours to draw up. We will tell you what has to be in it, and we will tell you if what the plant has offered is not enough to support it — see the Declaration of Conformity page for the nine elements that make a document one.
What you are responsible for: registering with the scheme in each country where you place the goods, and reporting the volumes. See EPR packaging by country for how that works in Germany and the Netherlands.
Note: intellectual property in the artwork stays yours. Plates carrying your design are used for your orders only, and are destroyed on request in writing.