Stickers are a great way to express your brand, share your personality and create community. They can be used for everything from marketing campaigns and counterculture movements to political rallies and fandom gatherings. They are also a very effective form of self-promotion and are a highly affordable marketing tool.
There are many different ways to print stickers, from the most traditional to the modern. The most common is screen-printing, a simple process that uses synthetic screens to move ink onto the sticker paper. This method is great for small quantities and for creating stickers in a custom shape.
Another method of printing stickers is offset printing. This method uses CMYK color formatting to separate the colors in the graphic into cyan, green, yellow and black inks. This allows the printer to print high-quality graphics with a wide variety of colors and tones.
You can also create your own stickers using a digital camera or a smart phone and a free online design tool like Photoshop. You can download the Adobe Photoshop app for free or use the stripped down version called Photoshop Express. Both of these are very easy to learn and will allow you to create professional-looking stickers. Be sure to set the image file size to CMYK color mode, and remember to leave a bleed line and safe zone when designing your sticker.
If you are creating a large batch of stickers it is a good idea to run the stickers through a laser printer that can handle heavy, thick paper like vinyl. A sticker sheet can weigh several pounds and will put a lot of pressure on the laser printer’s rollers. Leaving a sticker sheet in the laser printer for too long can damage it.