Leader Printing makes cake boxes wholesale and the rest of the bakery counter: windowed cartons, handle boxes, rigid chocolate boxes with compartment trays, mooncake gift sets and kraft bags. One factory in Fuzhou has printed and finished this work since 1976. You bake it; we build what carries it out the door and keeps it presentable when it gets there.
1,000 folding cartons per size and design, 500 rigid. Enough for one season of a flavor livery, not a warehouse commitment.
Food-grade board available for direct-contact layers, greaseproof liners where icing sits against the box. Inks are soy based and print on the outer surface.
Die-cut windows patched with clear food-safe film on a dedicated machine. Clean edges on curved shapes, anti-fog grade for chilled displays.
A tiered cake pulls hard on a handle. We spec board weight and lock-bottom construction against the loaded weight on our box printing lines, then test with a dummy load.
Mooncake and Chinese New Year gift sets have run on this floor for decades: drawer boxes, hinged lids, ribbon closures and cavity trays.
FSC chain-of-custody and ISO 9001 paperwork goes out with your quotation on request. No leaf logos without documents behind them.
| Formats | Folding cartons (windowed, handle, tall tier), rigid boxes (two-piece, drawer, hinged), kraft bags, sleeve and tray favor boxes. |
|---|---|
| Substrate | 250–450 gsm FBB, SBS and kraft board; food-grade board available for direct-contact layers; greaseproof liner option; 1.5–3.0 mm grey-board for rigid; FSC-certified stocks available. |
| Print method | Sheet-fed offset up to 8 colors with soy-based inks, digital (Heidelberg Versafire) for runs under about 3,000 units. |
| Finishing | Hot foil, embossing, debossing, spot UV, soft-touch lamination, food-safe window patching, ribbon closures. |
| Inserts | Compartment trays for chocolates, 4–6 cavity mooncake trays, folded-board macaron inserts, board platforms under heavy items. |
| MOQ | 1,000 units folding carton per size and design, 500 units rigid. |
| Lead time | 12–25 days production + transit. Book 8+ weeks ahead of festival delivery dates. |
Where food touches board, the board is the product. Direct-contact layers use food-grade stock, and where grease or icing would sit against print we add a greaseproof liner or a plain board platform so the printed surface never meets the bake. Inks are soy based and stay on the outer face of the carton. The window patch on a cake box is a clear food-safe film, applied to the inside of the die-cut on a dedicated patching machine, with an anti-fog grade for chilled cabinets.
What we will not do is quote regulation numbers we have not verified for your market. Food-contact rules differ by country and by what the packaging holds, and a factory reciting clause numbers is a poor substitute for your own compliance check. What we supply instead: material specification sheets for every stock and liner on your job, so that check runs on data rather than a supplier's word.
The same material logic applies to bags. For the detail on stocks, liners and printing choices there, see our note on food-grade paper bags.
Mid-Autumn and CNY are our home fixtures. Every summer the rigid line fills with mooncake work: drawer and hinged gift sets, 4 to 6 cavity trays, foil-heavy liveries and ribbon closures. The construction habits that come from that annual peak, tray tolerances, lid fit, insert glue that holds through humid transit, carry straight over to chocolate boxes for any market.
Christmas and Valentine's run on the same lines. Truffle assortment boxes, heart-format two-piece boxes and countdown formats all build from the compartment-tray logic above. If a Christmas countdown box is on your list, our teardown of advent calendar box costs shows where the money goes in that construction.
Book 8 or more weeks before you need goods on the water for any festival window, Q4 included. The factory closes for roughly two weeks around Chinese New Year, and freight tightens in the weeks before the holiday, so orders landing in Q1 need to be confirmed well before the closure. Later is sometimes possible; it is never cheaper.
Run length decides the print method. Digital wins up to roughly 3,000 units. Offset starts amortizing its plates and setup above roughly 8,000. Between those points it depends on colors and finishes, and we quote both ways. Bakeries feel this more than most: seasonal flavors and limited liveries mean short runs of many designs, so a 12-month carton inventory bought for a better unit price often outlives the flavor it was printed for.
Factory numbers, not reseller numbers. Most cake boxes wholesale pricing you find online carries a trading company margin on top of a factory price. The ranges below are ours. Kraft and FSC-certified stocks are available on every format here, and the chain-of-custody certificate goes out with the quotation on request.
| 2026 ballpark, ex-works, artwork ready | |
|---|---|
| 1,000 windowed cake boxes | ≈ $0.35–0.65 / unit |
| 1,000 macaron boxes with insert | ≈ $0.45–0.80 / unit |
| 500 rigid chocolate boxes with tray | ≈ $1.80–3.00 / unit |
| 500 mooncake gift sets, drawer, 4–6 cavity | ≈ $2.80–4.80 / unit |
Indicative ranges only. Size, board weight, window area, foil coverage and tray type move these numbers. Send your spec through the quotation form or build one in Studio for a firm price in one business day.
Send box dimensions, cake weight or a reference photo. Our engineers respond within one business day with construction advice and a firm price.
Request a quoteDirect-contact layers are built from food-grade board, and we add greaseproof liners where icing or butter sits against the box. Inks are soy based and print on the outer surface, away from the food. We keep these as material capability statements and supply spec sheets for the exact stocks on your job, so your own compliance check runs on data.
A clear food-safe film, glued to the inside of the die-cut window on a dedicated patching machine. It holds a clean edge on curved window shapes and stays bonded in a chilled display case. An anti-fog grade is available for refrigerated cakes.
1,000 units per size and design for folding cartons, and 500 for rigid chocolate and gift boxes. For carton runs under about 3,000 units we usually quote digital print, which keeps plates and setup out of the price.
Eight weeks or more before you need goods on the water, for Mid-Autumn, Christmas or Valentine's alike. The factory closes for roughly two weeks around Chinese New Year and freight tightens in the weeks before it, so Q1 delivery dates need orders confirmed well before the holiday.
