Belly Bands

Belly band printing involves customising a ‘band’ or heavy-weight flexible paper or cardboard with your choice of design, and then using it to package a promotional product, printed material or a gift. When printed beautifully, belly bands offer unique marketing real estate that can be used to increase brand visibility and share your key selling points or message. Here we delve into the ins and outs of promotional belly band printing.

A quick definition

Traditionally, belly bands are used effectively to ‘wrap’ around magazines (think of when you last opened a magazine and how the numerous supplements or offers were bundled inside) but they can also be used for so much more. Digitally printed heavy-weight paper is cut to size and glued at the edges to form a type of product ‘sleeve’.

If you need to bundle any two products together (whether gifts or printed material), you should consider investing in belly band packaging, not only because it’s a great packaging option, but because it allows you the chance to showcase your brand and unique message. Belly band packaging also works well when used to wrap a gift – think notebook or gift box – allowing you the space and opportunity to further personalise your corporate or team gifts.

The advantages of belly band printing

Here’s why we love using belly band printing to custom-brand products:

• The perfect canvas on which to share your business branding and message

Investing in belly band printing is a popular option for businesses who want to display more than just a logo on their promotional products. The space allows for a marketing campaign message, business contact details, a competition, social media handles or hashtags, product information or a personal message to be displayed and, because a belly band is the first thing to catch a consumer’s attention when they receive their wrapped corporate gift, it’s a highly effective marketing tool too. Remember, they have to remove the band before they can access the product, so it’s likely they’ll notice what you’ve chosen to strategically print on the belly band.

• A sustainable form of packaging

If you’ve been looking for the most economical way to package your promotional products, then this is it. Because belly bands can be made in a variety of widths, paper types and textures, they provide an alternative solution to traditional full-coverage packaging. Technically your product is still ‘wrapped’ but you’re using less material to do it, and you have a great canvas to display your logo and communicate your marketing message too. What a win.

• A great way to bundle two or more products

The bonus of a belly band is that it is highly functional. If you need to bundle two or more products (think a notebook and pen set), a digitally printed belly band will package them both up neatly.

• A chance to personalise your corporate gifts

Looking for end-of-year gift ideas? How about a stylish notebook with a belly band, printed with a heartfelt message to thank your team or clients for a great year? Whatever it is you want to share, belly bands give you the chance to personalise a corporate gift and, as we all know, a personal gift is the most appreciated.

• How we choose the right belly band

When it comes to belly band printing, it’s important to ensure the band will fit the product, which means that knowing the width of the product is vital. The belly band will need to overlap slightly so that it fits tightly around the product. The recommended overlap measurement is 25mm.

• Which products work best with belly bands?

Also referred to as book bands, or jacket bands, belly bands can be used to secure books, magazines and folders, but they’re also often used to wrap stationery such as wedding invitations, bundled notebooks, iPad folios and even clothing items like socks, scarves or promotional golf shirts.

Interested in finding out more about belly band printing in South Africa? We can help. Get in touch with us today to find out more.