What the process looks like
Where it is the right choice
- Premium gift and corporate programmes
- Anything that will be washed hundreds of times
- Matte black or coloured powder coat, where contrast is strongest
- Small type and fine line work — the beam holds detail
Where it is the wrong choice
Saying this out loud saves a sample round. If your artwork falls into one of these, tell us at enquiry and we will point you at the process that suits it.
- Multi-colour brand marks — laser cannot do colour
- Logos that rely on a light and dark tone of the same colour
- Full-wrap artwork — use heat transfer
- Bodies with a coating the client wants left untouched
Cost and minimum order
About $0.10–0.50 per piece depending on how much area the beam has to cover. No screens and no plates, so short runs are not penalised the way they are with printing. MOQ is 500 pieces per design in stock colours, 1,000 if the body is in your own Pantone. The exact figure depends on your artwork and run size, and we come back with it by the next working day.
What to send us
Vector, one tone. If your mark has shading, send us the flat single-colour version — we can convert it, but you should be the one to approve how it simplifies. We return the mockup free before anything is quoted as final.
Two runs that show where laser is easy and where it is not
30,000 pieces, seven Pantone bodies, one engraved mark. A German supermarket chain needed the chain’s own logo on every unit across seven custom colours, against a 45-day standard lead time they wanted shortened. Three lines ran staggered and the order shipped in 29 days. Laser suited it because the mark was identical on every piece while the bodies were not — no screens to remake per colour.
The one that nearly went wrong: engraving over an ice-crack finish. On our titanium-look bodies with a textured ice-crack surface, the beam blurs easily — the texture scatters it and the mark reads mushy. We adjusted power settings repeatedly and only ran the bulk after a sample was approved. If your body has a texture rather than a flat coat, expect a sampling round before anyone quotes you a date.
Products these ran on: TI-1250, Titanium-1004, Titanium-1008.
What we need to quote it
Engraving is quoted by how much area the beam covers, so the size of the mark matters more than the size of the run. Four things, and the quote comes back by the next working day: the model (or the body size and material you have in mind), the run size, the artwork file, and the destination country. The last one decides carton format, labelling and how the freight is calculated, and it is cheaper to answer at enquiry than after 5,000 boxes are printed.
If you are still choosing between methods, send the artwork and say what it is for. We will tell you which process we would run and why, including when the answer is a cheaper one than the page you are reading.
MOPA colour laser — the exception to “laser has no colour”
A MOPA source can shift the oxide layer on stainless into a range of tones, which reads as a colour gradient rather than a printed colour. It is slower than standard marking and the result varies with the steel, so we sample it before quoting a run. Ask for it by name if you have seen it and want it — it is not what a standard laser quote includes.
See it running
Laser engraving compared with printing, filmed on our lines.
Frequently asked
Whatever the steel under the coating gives you — typically bright on a dark powder coat, and a faint warm grey on bare stainless. It is one tone, so a mark built from two shades of the same colour arrives as one shade.
It needs sampling first. On our ice-crack titanium-look finishes the texture scatters the beam and the mark blurs; we adjusted power repeatedly before running bulk. If your body has a texture rather than a flat coat, budget a sampling round.
A MOPA source can shift the oxide layer into a range of tones, which reads as a gradient rather than a printed colour. It is slower, varies with the steel, and is sampled before we quote — ask for it by name.
Silk screen at volume, in one colour. The comparison across every method, with per-piece figures, is on the logo cost page.
500 pieces per design in stock colours; 1,000 if you want the body in your own Pantone.
A digital mockup comes back the same day or the next working day, free. A printed sample takes 7–10 days, because it goes through the same line the bulk order will. That sample, not the screen file, is what the run is judged against.
Ask for the specific model and decoration combination rather than a general answer — how a mark holds up depends on the body finish underneath as much as on the process. We will tell you what we have seen come back from repeat buyers.