Custom Folding Cartons

From one flat sheet to a carton

One sheet of paperboard, cut and creased flat, with a single glued seam holding it into a tube.

There is no fluting inside the board, just solid stock, which is why print sits flatter and sharper on a carton than on a corrugated box. The carton is delivered as a flat tube and squared up at packing.

Tooling is one cutting die plus a plate per colour. The die carries the creases as well as the cuts, and those creases decide whether a carton squares up cleanly on a packing line or fights whoever is filling it.

• Solid paperboard, no flute
• One glue seam; everything else folds
• Ships flat, squared up at packing

Tuck end or auto-lock bottom?

Tuck ends cost less. An auto-lock base sets up faster and carries more weight.

A straight or reverse tuck end closes with flaps at both ends. It is the cheapest style to make and perfectly sound for light contents, but the packer folds both ends by hand on every unit.

An auto-lock bottom, also called a crash-lock, is glued so the base forms itself as the carton is squared. It costs more per unit and removes a step from every pack, which becomes real money at volume, and it takes more weight before the base gives. Tell us roughly how many you pack and we suggest which base pays off.

• Tuck end: lowest cost, both ends closed by hand
• Auto-lock: base forms itself, faster to pack, holds more

Choosing the board

Two decisions: how white the surface is, and how thick the board is. The thickness is the one that fails.

SBS is bleached through the sheet and prints closest to what a screen shows, which is why cosmetics and supplements tend to default to it. Uncoated and recycled boards feel more natural in the hand, absorb more ink, and soften fine detail.

Caliper gets less thought than it deserves. Board that is too thin lets a tall carton lean once it is on a shelf; board that is too thick cracks along the crease as it folds, and cracking shows worst through dark solid ink. Heavier is not automatically safer, so tell us the carton's height and what it holds, and we choose a caliper that stands up without cracking.

• SBS: whitest surface, sharpest print
• Kraft and recycled: warmer, cheaper, shifts every colour on it
• Too thick cracks at the crease, too thin leans on shelf

Windows and coatings

A window sells the product and takes strength out of the panel it sits in.

A cut-out window lets the contents do the selling. It also removes structure, so a large window in a tall carton has to be placed around the creases rather than wherever the layout looks best, or the panel bows in the middle.

Film patched behind a window adds a lamination step and makes the carton harder to recycle. Gloss and matt varnishes cost far less than laminate, and spot gloss over a matt base is the usual way to get contrast without coating the whole sheet.

If it holds food

Food contact is decided by the board and the coating, and it has to be settled at quote rather than after proofing.

Anything touching food directly should be packed in a board and ink made for that use. Recycled fibre is often avoided for direct contact because of what can carry through from the recovered paper, so a food carton frequently means virgin board or a separate liner.

Greasy and wet contents are a different problem again: they need a barrier coating, and the choice of barrier is what decides whether the finished carton can be recycled. Tell us what goes inside before we quote and we build the specification around it.

Folding carton or mailer box?

A folding carton is the pick for the shelf and for packing inside another box. A mailer box is the pick when the product goes in the post on its own.

Paperboard has no flute, so it guards against scuffs and dust, not against being dropped. A carton posted on its own arrives creased at the corners. It is a retail and secondary pack by design, so for the post it belongs inside a shipper or a mailer box.

Weight is the other limit. Dense contents bow the panels and work the glue seam loose over time, and that is the point to move to corrugated rather than simply to a heavier board.