OEM packaging: formats, dielines and print quality
By Mohamad Sinno, Charcoal Expert ·
Ask AI for an importer brief:
Formats you can brand
Six things can carry your brand: three inner-box weights, two master cartons, and a house retail box that is already printed. The minimum on each is two tonnes, counted per SKU rather than per logo. Print adds two weeks to a new design, ten working days to one we have run before, and nothing at all to a box taken from stock.
| Format | Dimensions (mm) | Board and print | Minimum | Adds to the clock |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 kg inner box | By cube size — five recorded | Duplex 250 gsm over E-flute, varnished, CMYK | 2 t per SKU | 2 weeks new design · 10 working days existing |
| 500 g inner box | Not recorded — ask the export desk | Duplex 250 gsm over E-flute, varnished, CMYK | 2 t per SKU | 2 weeks new design · 10 working days existing |
| 250 g inner box | Not recorded — ask the export desk | Duplex 250 gsm over E-flute, varnished, CMYK | 2 t per SKU | 2 weeks new design · 10 working days existing |
| 10 kg master carton | By cube size — three recorded | Kraft K150/M125K150, single-wall B-flute, up to 3 colours | 2 t per SKU | 2 weeks new design · 10 working days existing |
| 20 kg master carton (cube 28) | 478 × 258 × 281 | Kraft K150/M125K150, single-wall B-flute, up to 3 colours | 2 t per SKU | 2 weeks new design · 10 working days existing |
| House retail box, our design | Not recorded — ask the export desk | Duplex 250 gsm over E-flute, varnished, CMYK | 2 t per SKU | None — held in stock |
Three of those dimension cells are empty, and they are empty on purpose. The 500 g and 250 g inner boxes are real formats we run, and the branded master cartons that go with a house design are real too — but our packaging record holds measured dimensions for the 1 kg inner and the unbranded masters only. Halving the 1 kg figures would produce numbers you could not distinguish from measurements, so the export desk sends the real ones on request instead. The same rule covers inner boxes for the non-cube shapes: made, not written down.
The dimensions we do record
A dieline starts from an external dimension, so these are the numbers a designer actually needs. The inner box changes shape with the cube size it holds — the 26 mm box is a cube, the 27 mm box is a long shallow tray — which is why a lineup of two sizes is two dielines and not one artwork scaled twice.
| Size | Dimensions |
|---|---|
| Cube 22 mm | 97 × 81 × 186 |
| Cube 25 mm | 105 × 80 × 157 |
| Cube 26 mm | 111 × 111 × 111 |
| Cube 27 mm | 170 × 88 × 88 |
| Cube 28 mm | 119 × 88 × 120 |
| Size | Dimensions |
|---|---|
| Cube 25 mm | 415 × 217 × 164 |
| Cube 26 mm | 560 × 225 × 115 |
| Cube 28 mm · 20 kg | 478 × 258 × 281 |
| Cube 28 mm · 10 kg | 478 × 258 × 90 |
Two of the master rows carry a net weight and two do not, and that is how our record reads rather than an oversight in the table: the cube 28 carton exists in both a 20 kg and a 10 kg build, so those two rows have to be told apart. The standard master is 10 kg net. Choosing a box lineup for your channel is the decision these numbers feed, and how many designs fit in one container is the arithmetic on the other side of it.
Artwork that clears prepress first time
We supply the dieline files. Artwork comes back as vector, illustrator preferred; cmyk plus pantone; we supply the dielines. That much is a handoff spec and it is easy; what is not easy is the panel content, because a charcoal retail box is a regulated surface in two of the markets our buyers sell into and an unregulated one in a third. A design that clears prepress can still be unsellable in Ontario.
That is the reason the artwork stage is where first orders actually lose time, and it is the stage the file rules alone will not save you from. Dieline and artwork requirements takes the two halves in turn: the file specification a printer needs, and the regulatory panel, read from the instruments themselves rather than from what other suppliers put on their boxes.
How print quality is controlled
Nothing goes to press until you have signed off a proof against the dieline, and nothing ships until the printed box has been checked against that approved proof rather than against somebody's memory of it. Those are two separate approvals with two different failure modes: the first catches a wrong design, the second catches a right design printed badly. The print QA checklist sets out both gates and what to do when the second one finds something.
There is one route where none of this applies to you, and it is worth knowing before you commission a designer. Our three house retail designs are always in stock — no print lead time, already printed and already proofed; the only thing that changes on them is a side-panel sticker with your company name and contact details. That fork — a stock box or your own decides how much of this page you ever need.
A last distinction, because the words get used interchangeably and they should not be. Everything above is branded packaging. Our standard export packaging — the unprinted inner and the plain master a bulk order ships in — is a different specification with a different cost, and it is what you get if you are repacking under your own roof after import.
Send us a dieline, or ask for one
Tell the export desk the shape, the size and the inner format you are planning and you will get the dieline pack for exactly that box. If your designer would rather start from a printed example than a flat file, ask for a house box in the same message.