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B.Y.O.P. – “Bring Your Own Packaging” might not catch on in pop culture vocabularies, but it’s a familiar idea for brands. With craft brewers making up nearly a quarter of the beer market share in the United States, competition is intense; according to research, 71% of craft beer consumers decide which product to buy at the point of purchase. The good news is that 66% of customers say that a beer’s package or label is “very” or “extremely” important in capturing their attention – in other words, beer packaging is an opportunity to up your game and catch the attention and curiosity of customers in the grocery store aisles. So how can you rise above the competition?
Compete with the Big Brands
As smaller craft breweries look for savvy ways to take shelf space and market share, from the mammoth conglomerates, your packaging design is a great way to leverage visual assets that you already have, or can create for specialty brews.
High quality packaging is in fact a form of advertising, like small billboards that can stand out amid the clutter. It sets an expectation for what their after-work or Friday night experience will hold, giving a taste of the taste to come.
You’ve Got to Know When To Hold ‘em, Know When to Fold ‘em
Just like a label – a well-crafted, eye-catching folding cartons and carrier can attract new customers and make it easy for them to take your beer home. Our cartons and carriers are available in a wide variety of paperboard styles… in standard and custom sizes… and with gloss, matte, spot-varnish, metallic, and other premium finishes. And thanks to our Trident MAX seven-color printing process for labels and cartons, you know that your designs are always vibrant, impactful, and consistent.
No Minimums Mean No Waste
Other packaging and label companies require a 5,000-unit minimum order quantity, but at Belmark we never require minimums for your order, so you’ll never have to buy more packaging than you need. Let’s say you’re brewing a seasonal batch of 30 barrels and want to package 5,000 bottles in 833 six pack cartons. Belmark helps you minimize costs AND reduce warehouse space, freeing you up to support experimental, seasonal and event-driven releases with just the right amount of cartons. All while building repeat customers and curiosity from beer buyers for your brand.
Working with Belmark also means less waste for the planet. Not only are cartons a great alternative to plastic handles, but we also lead the way in other sustainability initiatives – like packaging with our Mindful Solutions range of environmentally responsible products. Our tru-IMPACT® cartons are responsibly sourced and are available with various levels of post-consumer waste materials, and our eco-READY™ products are easy to recycle so materials can go back into use again and again.
Yes, You Can
We offer can cartons in custom sizes: whatever you need, with no minimums. If it’s simpler to choose from a standard size, we offer:
• 4-pack can cartons: 12oz slim and 16oz
• 6-pack can cartons: 12oz slim and 12oz
• 8-pack can cartons: 12oz
• 12-pack can cartons: 12oz
• 15-pack can cartons: 12oz
Better for Bottles
We also offer bottle carriers in custom sizes; standard offerings include:
• 4-pack bottle carriers: 12oz
• 6-pack bottle carriers: 12oz long-neck
• 6-pack bottle carriers: 12oz heritage
Try Out a Twelve-Pack
Again, since we don’t require minimums, you’re free to test out the twelve-pack trend that picked up so much momentum during the pandemic. The rapid acceleration of twelve-pack sales during 2020 caught the industry by surprise, and many craft breweries saw it as an opportunity to promote their best-sellers in volume, as well as to create variety packs of smaller batch beers.
What You Need, When You Need it
At Belmark, speed-to-market is one of our core values. Your craft brewery should never be held back by packaging when you need to get a product to market fast. With Belmark’s short lead times — three weeks or less — you’ll always have cartons in time to meet your release deadlines.
We even offer a unique biweekly carton-fulfillment program for standard carrier and carton sizes: Orders are placed on the first and third Friday of each month; those orders are printed and shipped by the end of the following week. No other carton supplier in the USA offers this service model. It’s all about supporting craft brewers getting their freshly brewed beer to market on time.
Castle Danger taps the power of packaging to bring its brewery experience to the retail shelf.
Your One Stop Shop for All of Your Packaging Needs
At Belmark, we offer a diverse portfolio of packaging solutions for beer cans, bottles, crowlers, growlers and kegs, including pressure sensitive labels and shrink sleeves for cans and bottles in a range of sizes and finishes. Our design experts are always on hand to guide you from concept to final product. By partnering with a single supplier, you’ll save time and effort and ensure consistent branding — and quality — across all of your packaging.
Creating great beer is your craft. Creating great packaging, in the right quantities, when you need it, is our craft. There’s no minimum order but also rest assured we have capacity to handle much larger orders as well.
Just like you strive to build lasting relationships with your customers, we are here to support you as your business grows and you extend your brewery experience from the taproom to the retail shelf.
