Ordering packaging you have never seen or held is an uncomfortable thing to do. You are guessing at the size, guessing at how sturdy the board is, and guessing at how your logo will look once it lands on brown kraft. A sample removes all three guesses, and it costs almost nothing.
Here is how sampling actually works, what each type of sample tells you, and what to look for when one arrives on your desk.
There are two different things people call a "sample"
They do completely different jobs, and knowing which one you need saves a lot of back and forth.
A blank sample is the bare, unprinted product. It answers physical questions: is this box the right size for my product, is the board thick enough, does the bag feel cheap or does it feel like something a customer would keep. You can order one from our samples range for a couple of pence.
A printed sample, sometimes called a proof, is your artwork on the actual product. It answers design questions: is the logo the right size, does that colour hold up on kraft, is the text legible from arm's length. You do not order this separately. It is part of every order as standard.
Start with a blank sample if size or feel matters
Manufacturing tolerance on stock packaging is 10 to 20mm either way. That is fine for most things and a genuine problem for others. If your product only just fits, or you are relying on a box staying inside a specific Royal Mail size band, hold the real thing before you buy 500 of them. Our postal boxes are E-flute 1.6mm corrugated, paper mailing bags are 2-ply 70gsm and carrier bags are 70 to 100gsm brown kraft. Those numbers mean very little until the item is in your hand.
Sizing also has a direct cost attached. A box that pushes you from one postage band into the next costs you money on every single order, forever. If that is your situation, measure the sample yourself rather than trusting the listed dimensions to the millimetre.
What the printed proof is for
We do not process or print a full order until you have approved a printed sample. That is the Total Satisfaction Guarantee and it is not a formality. Depending on what suits you, the sample comes as an emailed image, a video, or a physical printed item in the post. You get unlimited amendments until you are completely happy, and if the printed sample is not right, you get a full refund with no quibble.
This matters more than it sounds, because printing onto pre-manufactured stock is not the same as printing onto flat paper. The surface has texture, the material has its own colour, and both change how ink reads. A proof is the only honest way to find that out.
What to actually check when the sample arrives
Most people look at a proof and check whether they like it. Useful, but not enough. Work through these instead:
- Position. Print sits in pre-defined print areas, not across the whole product. Check your artwork is where you expected it and that nothing important is running close to a fold or seam. Our article on which areas of a box you can print on covers this in more detail.
- Colour. Compare it to your screen, then forget your screen. On brown and manila materials colour shifts warmer and darker. There is no guaranteed Pantone match in digital print, so judge the sample on its own merits.
- Anything white. There is no white ink. White areas in your artwork come out as the bare material, which on kraft means brown. If your logo relies on white detail, the proof is where you will see the problem.
- Legibility. Put the sample at the far end of a desk. Small text and fine lines that looked crisp on a monitor often disappear at real size.
- Solid blocks. Large areas of flat colour print inconsistently on textured stock. If your design has one, the sample will show you honestly whether it works.
- Existing markings. Supplier branding or barcodes appear on parts of some boxes and wrap mailers, and there is small branding on the bottom of paper mailing bags. It is not a blank canvas, and you should know where those sit before you finalise a layout.
How sampling fits around your lead time
Sampling does not have to slow you down. We print in-house and hold high stock of our own blank products, so orders go out same day locally where availability allows, next day, or on the standard 3 to 5 day service.
The one thing to plan for: if you need a fast turnaround, you need to be available to approve the proof. The clock effectively pauses while a proof sits in an unread inbox. If you are ordering on a Friday for a Monday deadline, make sure someone can say yes on the day.
Getting it right first time
The fastest route through sampling is to send artwork that is already in good shape. Print-ready files, correct formats, no surprises. Our guide on how to supply artwork covers the common issues, and most delays we see come from one of them.
From there it is straightforward. Order a blank if you need to check the physical product, upload your artwork when you place the order for printed postal boxes or anything else in the range, review the proof properly, and only then does the full run get printed. If you have questions before you start, the FAQ page answers most of them.
Nobody should be committing to a few hundred printed boxes on faith. Take the sample.
