Leader Printing is a cosmetic box manufacturer, not a bottle factory. We make the secondary packaging: rigid boxes, folding cartons, labels and paper bags that go around your jars, tubes, pumps and droppers. If you need airless pumps or glass, we are the wrong supplier. If you need the packaging that carries your brand, printed and finished in one factory since 1976, read on.
500 custom cosmetic boxes in rigid board or 1,000 folding cartons per SKU. You can test a shade range without warehousing a year of stock.
Makeup packaging boxes carry the finish that sells them. Hot foil, deboss, soft-touch lamination, raised spot UV and edge gilding, all done in-house on our box printing lines.
EVA, molded pulp, folded board and vacuum-formed PET fitments sized to your exact jar, dropper bottle or perfume box packaging.
Foil, transparent and tactile label printing under the same roof, so carton and jar label match batch for batch.
We check dielines against EU Regulation (EC) 1223/2009 layout rules before plates are made, not after.
Supplier greenwashing is widespread in beauty sourcing. We send FSC and ISO certificates on request instead of just printing a leaf on the site.
| Formats | Rigid set-up boxes, folding cartons, sleeves, labels, laminated paper bags, corrugated mailers. |
|---|---|
| Substrate | 250–450 gsm FBB, SBS, kraft and recycled board; 1.5–3.0 mm grey-board for rigid; PCR and FSC-certified stocks available. |
| Print method | Sheet-fed offset up to 8 colors, digital (Heidelberg Versafire) for runs under about 3,000 units. |
| Finishing | Hot and cold foil, embossing, debossing, raised spot UV, soft-touch lamination, holographic film, edge gilding. |
| Inserts | EVA foam, molded pulp, vacuum-formed PET, folded board, ribbon pulls. Drop-tested with your filled containers. |
| MOQ | 500 units rigid, 1,000 units folding carton. Labels from 2,000 pieces. |
| Lead time | 12–25 days production + 8–32 days transit depending on destination. |
If you sell in the EU, Regulation (EC) 1223/2009 Article 19(1) sets what must appear on the packaging. Six items go on both the container and the outer box: the responsible person's name and address, nominal content, durability date, precautions, batch number and the product's function. One item gets relief: the INCI ingredient list, in descending order of weight with nanomaterials flagged "(nano)", may sit on the outer packaging alone. Imported products must also state the country of origin, so our export cartons carry "Made in China" as standard.
Durability marking trips up more artwork than anything else. Products with a shelf life over 30 months need the open-jar PAO symbol with a period in months, "12M" for example. Products at 30 months or less need "best before end of" with a date, or the Annex VII hourglass symbol. We keep both symbols as vector assets and place them at legible size on your dieline during prepress.
Practical help we give every beauty client: reserved batch-code zones free of lacquer so inkjet coding holds, minimum 5 pt type checks on INCI panels, and a prepress report flagging any mandatory element missing from your artwork. For finish options on regulated labels see our guide to foil, transparent and tactile cosmetic labels.
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. For beauty this matters more than in other categories: ingredient and claim changes force label and carton revisions often, so a 12-month carton inventory bought for a better unit price can become waste paper after one reformulation. Short digital runs cost more per unit and less per year.
Sustainable stocks carry a real premium. PCR and bio-based materials typically run 10 to 30 percent above virgin equivalents. We say that upfront so it lands in your quote, not in a surprise invoice. And because greenwashing is widespread among packaging suppliers, we do not ask you to take claims on trust: FSC chain-of-custody and ISO 9001 certificates go out on request with your quotation.
| 2026 ballpark, ex-works, artwork ready | |
|---|---|
| 1,000 folding cartons, 30 ml serum | ≈ $0.28–0.55 / unit |
| 1,000 rigid two-piece lipstick boxes | ≈ $1.10–1.90 / unit |
| 500 magnetic gift boxes with insert | ≈ $2.40–3.80 / unit |
Indicative ranges only. Size, board weight, foil coverage and insert type move these numbers. Send your spec through the quotation form or build one in Studio for a firm price in one business day.
Shipping DTC to the UK? Royal Mail Large Letter caps the pack at 353 × 250 × 25 mm. That 25 mm ceiling kills most standard cartons with foam inserts. We design cartons with structural cushioning folded into the blank itself, which holds a glass dropper safely inside the 25 mm limit and deletes the separate insert from your bill of materials.
Send your bottle dimensions, artwork or a reference photo. Our engineers respond within one business day with construction advice and a firm price.
Request a quote500 units for rigid boxes and 1,000 for folding cartons. Labels start lower. For carton runs under about 3,000 units we usually quote digital print, which keeps plates and setup out of the price.
We check your dieline against the placement rules in EU Regulation (EC) 1223/2009 Article 19(1): responsible person address, nominal content, durability marking, precautions, batch number and product function on both container and outer packaging, with the INCI list allowed on the outer packaging alone. Your responsible person owns the legal content. We make sure it fits, prints legibly and survives finishing.
Yes. We supply a free digital proof, then a physical white dummy in the correct board and construction, then a pre-production sample with print and finishes. Sampling typically takes 5 to 7 days plus courier.
Yes. We build EVA foam, molded pulp, vacuum-formed PET and folded-board inserts sized to your exact bottle, and drop-test loaded boxes before mass production.
