Label Planet
How to use sticky labels to make seals for products, packaging, and document.
Sticky Labels As Seals: Printed Vs Unprinted Seals
Seals are really versatile tools that can help promote your brand or personalise products, packaging, documents, envelopes, and gifts. You can use printed, unprinted, or handwritten sticky labels to create your perfect seals.
Print your company name or logo to add extra branding to products, packaging, and correspondence. Add a personal message, photo, or design to postal items or gifts, especially those for special occasions such as birthdays, weddings, or Christmas.
Alternatively, you may simply need sticky labels to keep your products, packaging, and documents safely and securely sealed. For a subtle finish use white labels or transparent labels. If you prefer a touch of decoration, try coloured labels or gloss labels (see Recommended Materials For Seals).
Sticky Labels As Seals: Permanent Vs Removable Adhesives For Seals
You must choose the right adhesive to ensure your seals will actually seal things. First you need to choose a permanent or removable adhesive.
PERMANENT ADHESIVES: these adhesives create strong adhesive bonds that are difficult to break. Ideal if items need to be securely sealed during storage and/or transit before being opened.
We supply a range of permanent adhesives; generally speaking, our standard permanent adhesives will form perfectly good seals.
If you are applying seals onto unusual materials (e.g. plastics, fabrics etc), curved surfaces, or over edges, you may wish to choose a high tack, or marine adhesive.
Our freezer adhesive is best for sealing items stored and/or used in freezer conditions. This adhesive was designed specifically to create and sustain adhesive bonds in deep freeze conditions.
Finally, if you are looking for security seals, we would recommend our void labels – SVP (see Top Tips For Security Seals).
REMOVABLE ADHESIVES: these adhesives create temporary bonds and won’t damage items when sticky labels are removed. Perfect if opening or removing a seal must not damage previously sealed items. For example, if you are sealing important documents or gift items – especially those made of glass or paper – removing a seal made with a permanent adhesive could damage those items either by tearing the surface or leaving behind adhesive residue.
Our standard removable adhesive is ideal for most temporary applications. If you are labelling items made of glass or paper, or gift items, we recommend our super removable adhesive.
Removable adhesives are best suited for use as seals that are to be applied directly onto items (rather than packaging), where those items are also to be retained by the recipient (meaning those items must not be damaged).
Sticky Labels As Seals: Top Tips For Label Sizes & Shapes
Most people choose a non-rectangular shape for seals as this offers a more decorative appearance. Round labels / circular labels are the most popular – although square labels and oval labels are also commonly used. Any shape can create suitable seals. The most important factor is the surface area available to create an adhesive bond.
If you are applying your seals onto a perfectly flat surface, you can use any material/adhesive/shape/size combination. Problems may arise with curved surfaces or edges (e.g. when sealing a box or holding a gift bag closed).
All materials have “memory”; this property causes materials to try to return to their original shape after deformation. For example, after folding seals over the edge(s) of a box or gift bag they may try to “ping” back up. To prevent your seals pinging back into their flat state (thereby unsealing your items), the adhesive bond must be strong enough to overcome the memory of the material.
You can do this by selecting a stronger adhesive (e.g. a high tack or marine adhesive), a more flexible material (e.g. paper labels instead of polyester labels), or a larger label size (providing a larger surface area over which the adhesive can bond with your item leading to a stronger adhesive bond).
Sticky Labels As Seals: Recommended Materials For Seals
Most of our customers want decorative seals – although some materials are subtler than others. Here’s our guide to the most suitable materials for creating sticky seals:
- Paper Labels: a budget friendly option, which can be printed with a colourful design for a more decorative finish.
- Premium Quality Paper Labels: ideal for printing high resolution photographs or digital artwork. These sticky labels have a subtle matt finish and a super smooth surface for a high quality professional finish.
- High Tack Paper Labels: suitable for unusual materials, curved surfaces, or sealing edges.
- Gloss Paper Labels: we supply semi-gloss labels, gloss labels for laser printers, and photo quality gloss labels (for high resolution photos/artwork). The bright, shiny finish offers a subtle decorative finish in an instant.
- Coloured Labels: a quick and simple way to create decorative seals; choose from seven pastel shades for a subtle bloom of colour, five fluorescents for a burst of colour, gold and silver for a touch of luxury or seasonal flair, or a brown ribbed Kraft paper for a subtle touch of pattern and texture and a natural, homemade finish.
- Transparent Labels: a professional and decorative way to seal all sorts of items, transparent labels are a popular option.
Sticky Labels As Seals: Top Tips For Security Seals
Customers often ask for security seals to use on their products and/or packaging. These seals provide visual evidence when tampering has occured. We supply Silver Void Labels, which are silver labels with a special “VOID” adhesive. The adhesive layer splits on removal, leaving the word “VOID” on the previously labelled item.
NB: the purpose of tamper evident labels is to protect high value goods. If you simply need to keep products sealed until a customer opens them, use a standard paper label with a permanent adhesive. Paper labels tend to rip and/or leave behind adhesive residue when removed. The damage clearly indicates an item has been opened (and is far more cost effective).
Order Sticky Labels From Label Planet To Start Sealing Your Stuff!
To order sticky labels from Label Planet, simply head on over to www.labelplanet.co.uk. You can find all of our different materials and adhesives on our Product List.
Remember that you can always Request A Sample free of charge to make sure our products will work for your application. We also supply label templates for all of our label sizes, so if you’d like to add a design or message to your seals, simply download a label template from our website and get printing.
Products with a minimum order quantity of 25 sheets are available for same day despatch from stock. A 500 sheet minimum order quantity indicates a made to order item. As we are nearing Christmas, these items are taking five working days for despatch so order early to avoid disappointment.