Homebrew Labels

The forum for discussing all kinds of brewing paraphernalia.
jceg316

Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by jceg316 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 5:56 pm

Och29 - nice labels. They look consistent and professional and would not be out of place in a bar's fridge among some bottles of Kernel, Partizan, Beavertown etc.

I made all the beer for my wedding and have a friend who is really good at design, plus we both have a really similar "artistic style" so I could trust he'd come up with some great labels, which he did. To get them printed I went with a printer who prints for microbreweries: http://www.directlabelsuk.com/ who gave me the best quote when I was asking around. This was for 600 labels in total.

However, I needed to get 40 labels printed for my father in law's birthday, I said I'd make the beer, and I used Printed https://www.printed.com/. It was about £30 or so to get waterproof labels and they were really good quality.

I've also used a local printing company called The Printing Centre round the corner to my office for labels which are the cheapest. For 40 labels on standard label paper it was ~£6 or so. Recommended if you are based in central London as they are just off Tottenham Court Road.

och29
Piss Artist
Posts: 207
Joined: Sun Feb 17, 2013 7:32 pm

Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by och29 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 6:33 pm

Thanks for the info, I am based in London but have also had good experience with university printing companies. Imperial College is my closest so it's worth looking into if you need printing... sure UCL will have one near TCR too.
Drinking: AG#7 Final Sprint (APA), AG#8 Buckwheat Brett (Saison - Saison/Brett), AG#9 Helles Meister
Conditioning: -
Fermenting: Selection Pinot Grigio
Planning: Orange Blossom Mead, Mexican Honey Mead, Chocolate Stout

chris2012
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Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by chris2012 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 6:48 pm

I'm just looking at https://www.printed.com/ would you be able to tell me which option you used to
get waterproof bottle labels?

I'm wondering if they can cut non-rectangular labels too.

cheers

Chris

jceg316

Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by jceg316 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 7:23 pm

Hey Chris,

I clicked on Products>Labels and stickers (on the left hand side)>Product labels.

Then I clicked "Get started now". I chose the 63x88mm labels because these were for 330ml bottles, the max label size is 90mm. I use these bottles: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/171658020016? ... EBIDX%3AIT which seem like standard bottles.
(as a side point, these seem to be the cheapest 330ml bottles to buy in bulk, plus the service is really good.)

Set the orientation as Portrait, and for the material, I selected silver gloss but white polyester is also waterproof. I can't say for the latter, but silver gloss seemed really good. It's waterproof and it comes off pretty easily.

jceg316

Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by jceg316 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 7:31 pm

Just to add as well, they do round labels if required.

They require the image to be uploaded as a PDF in the best quality possible. It can get fiddly playing around with file types and image dimensions, but I found the easiest way to do this is in Powerpoint. Set the slide to the label dimensions, copy and paste the image and resize it so it's the size of the slide, then save as PDF.

chris2012
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Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by chris2012 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 7:36 pm

Cheers! Thanks a lot for that description.

By silver gloss does it mean the label appears silver in the white areas of your design?

jceg316

Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by jceg316 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 8:39 pm

No problem, glad to help. I'm not too sure what it means but it came out looking fine without a silver tint. Here are some pictures. The ones from Printed are the colourful ones of the guy standing. The other ones were from my local print shop.

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These pictures probably don't do the labels too much justice but they looked very nice!

chris2012
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Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by chris2012 » Wed Feb 04, 2015 8:43 pm

They look really good, cheers for the heads up on that site.

och29
Piss Artist
Posts: 207
Joined: Sun Feb 17, 2013 7:32 pm

Re: Homebrew Labels

Post by och29 » Fri Feb 20, 2015 5:30 pm

jceg316 wrote:To get them printed I went with a printer who prints for microbreweries: http://www.directlabelsuk.com/ who gave me the best quote when I was asking around. This was for 600 labels in total.
Took this advice and tried DirectLabels UK. I bought 150 as a trial run... they've just bought a new small batch printer with runs of under 500 in mind. There are a few teething problems at the moment with regards to getting the artwork setup for the printer which means they apparently printed these more of less at cost. Although they're not the easiest company (actually there's only one person who does sales) to deal with they were quite to get in contact about any problems and I'm happy with the result:


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These cost about £0.51 each inc. P&P, VAT etc. (for a run of 150 labels). If you fancy doing the same let them know that James from Iron Pear Brewery sent you their way!
Drinking: AG#7 Final Sprint (APA), AG#8 Buckwheat Brett (Saison - Saison/Brett), AG#9 Helles Meister
Conditioning: -
Fermenting: Selection Pinot Grigio
Planning: Orange Blossom Mead, Mexican Honey Mead, Chocolate Stout

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