How durable are my stickers?

The durability of stickers & labels is an important topic. Too durable and you’ve wasted money and not durable enough it can damage your brand.

If you’re using your labels for disposable packaging that gets recycled within days, then go for a less durable sticker to save money. However, to represent your brand over the long-term, then you have some options to get the perfect sticker.

When we talk about durability, we can break this down into three main categories:

• The knocks & scratches the sticker can take to its surface.
• Fade resistance.
• Resistance to harsh chemicals (e.g. cleaning fluids).

Knocks, scratches & cleaning

An over-laminate is a transparent, protective layer that sits over the printed layer to protect the printed surface of a sticker.

Having an over-laminate covering the print on your stickers is the best to ensure your stickers can handle more knocks, bumps, scratches & cleaning.

With a laminate, you’d be surprised at how much a sticker or label can take. It’ll easily go in & out of your pocket or bag hundreds of times and can be rubbed & wiped clean many times.

For stickers that are used briefly, such as takeaway food packaging, don’t use laminate. For more extended applications we recommend using a laminate. 

Laminates come in gloss or matte, depending on your preference. The only consideration is if you’re buying clear stickers, we recommend gloss, because of its higher transparency.

Fade resistance

Most colours will typically last 2-3 years outdoors and 3-5 years indoors which is way beyond 99% of all applications.

Fluorescent colours have the worst resistance to sunlight and therefore fade much quicker than ‘normal’ colours. Why? It’s due to a process called photobleaching. The fluorescence particles contained within the fluorescent pigment are susceptible to visible light, and overtime stop working and turn white, which makes them look faded.

The fluorescent materials we use will last up to 6 months outdoors and two years indoors; usually plenty of time. Read more on why they only last 6 months.

Chemical resistance

All stickers that have an over-laminate will be resistant to chemicals. If you’re exposing your stickers or labels to alcoholic based cleaners, we highly recommend using laminate.

Most digital inkjet print technologies will be able to withstand basic chemicals such as; dishwasher tablets, washing up liquid, WD-40, oil. UV cured ink may even handle more extreme chemicals such as; alcoholic based cleaners & petrol.

Summary

For short-term, disposable use, we recommend using a paper sticker with no laminate.

For longer-term use or when representing your brand, we recommend using a plastic sticker or label, with either a gloss or matte laminate.