| Choose a topic: Developing Product Lines
Technical Production Art
4 Printing Guidelines for Technical Production Artwork
5 Common Beverage & Food Package Design and FDA Errors
Items to Check on your Product’s Artwork
Frequently Asked Questions Developing Product Lines • The first package must be designed as part of a line regardless of the time until subsequent products rollout.
• Unless they are trained in package design, artists become boxed in by poor color and design choices. Your graphic artist must be able to visualize what the rest of the line will look like. Knowledge of design and color selection for multiple products saves thousands of dollars in wasted design time later when designers must recreate each new product as if it is a stand-alone.
• If you don't have someone at your company who knows why one design is better than another in terms of color, graphics, and legibility, you must use a very experienced packaging graphic design firm. Technical Production Art • Packaging graphics require a delicate balance between creativity, marketing expertise, and skilled technical production.
• It doesn't matter how good a package design looks on the computer screen when an unskilled artist creates it. Poorly built technical production artwork causes costly delays and throws off your entire product rollout.
• If most of the design elements are incorrectly placed, color selections are impossible to print, or production will cost a fortune because the designer made poor choices, you may have to start over. Back to the top
4 Printing Guidelines for Technical Production Artwork • Graphics need to be constructed with printer’s die templates.
• Colors must be selected with the production process and label manufacturer’s capability in mind.
• Elements on labels should be the correct distance inside the trim mark and should have common color top and bottom so that when they are trimmed there's not a small strip of color at the top and bottom of the label.
• The graphic artist needs to understand box and package manufacturers’ die lines and templates to ensure that all panels of the artwork are aligned correctly and will print. Back to the top 5 Common Beverage & Food Package Design and FDA Errors • Illegal placement of or missing government mandated copy and/or graphic elements.
• The content line must stand alone and must be the correct cap height.
• No copy can be placed the distance of the cap height above or below the content line.
• No copy can be placed within a specified distance to either side of the content line.
• The Identity Statement must be on the principal display panel. Items to Check on your Product’s Artwork • Is the correct symbol for trademark, copyright or registered in the correct place?
• Is each letter, word, and punctuation correct including Nutrition Facts and Ingredient Copy?
• Is the Authority Statement correct? If you want to truly control costs, you will work with experienced packaging designers. Ideally, someone at your company can be tasked with learning the rules of packaging graphics. You don’t have to know how to create the graphics in order to make sure that it is done right. At least several people need to proof the artwork before it is printed. Since you are ultimately legally liable for what you put out, several people must check everything on the package with a checklist. Back to the top | 
