One structure, several artworks — split the quantities

Structure and print are different lines

A folding gift box, a lid-and-base, or a carton has one cavity and one board. The picture on the wrap can change without changing that cavity. Those are not the same kind of change, and they do not belong in one quantity.

Write the structure once: family, inner or outer millimetres, core, wrap or SBS. Then list each artwork under it with its own quantity. “500 boxes, three designs” is not a quantity the plant can price until the 500 is split.

• One structure description.
• One quantity per artwork.
• Say if the designs ship together or as separate lots.

A new picture often means new plates, not a new knife

If the dieline, the board thickness, the window, and the magnet stay put, a second design is usually a prepress and press change. It is not automatically a new steel-rule die. The MOQ and tooling article on this site separates a new knife from a reprint. This page is the case where the knife may stand and the art does not.

“Usually” is not a factory rule for your file. A design that moves a foil position, adds a spot, or changes coverage can change makeready even when the die is unchanged. Put those differences on the list.

Do not add the quantities into one number

Three designs at 200 each is not the same press plan as one design at 600. Plates, wash-ups, and colour approvals repeat. Asking for “a unit price at 600” hides that.

If you want both readings — price each design at its own quantity, and also show what changes if one design takes the whole quantity — ask for both. Do not leave the plant to guess which total you meant.

This site does not publish a stock minimum or a plate charge. Those come back on the quote for the split you actually sent.

Each artwork has its own colour approval

A signed sheet for design A does not approve design B, even on the same board. Spot colours, foil, and large solids need their own look. The contractual-proof article says which object you are signing. Sign it per design.

Shared elements — the same Pantone red, the same foil on the same panel — can be named once and then pointed at by each design. The file for each design still has to exist.

What fails when three designs sit in one sentence

Split the sentence into rows before you ask for a date.

• “500 total, assorted prints”: no row has a quantity.
• One PDF of three designs and a single hex: each design needs its own match note.
• Assuming the second design is free of plates because the die exists: ask; do not assume.
• Holding all three designs to the slowest approval and still quoting one ship date in the email: say whether partial shipment is allowed.
• Using a catalog photo as design two: that photo is not your art file.