I recently made some stickers for Loud Room and it turned out to be a bit of a journey trying out different vendors. I’m always asking people for recommendations, so I wanted to share my own for sticker printers. I went in with two goals 1) avoid Sticker Mule and 2) lean toward silkscreened stickers.

I found a number of printers that silkscreen, but only a handful that stocked pre-mixed colors, usually a collection of around 10–30 Pantone colors or equivalents. Other places were limited to CMYK color mixing and Pantone color matching, which is totally ok if you are flexible, but could be tougher if you are aiming to match exact colors.

I had a great experience and ended up finding some solid printers. Here are the stickers I made:

Two square stickers in yellow and red with company info printed on the back, and a die-cut white sticker on clear vinyl (applied to laptop at top). My Favorites

Sticker Robot: Offers both digital and silkscreened stickers. Their silkscreening is limited to CMYK color mixing or PMS matching, no pre-mixed colors. Two great add-ons they offer: split backs on the sticker paper to make peeling off easy, and printing on the backing paper. The silkscreened stickers have a wonderful sturdiness to them, it feels like a thicker stock than others I’ve encountered. Prices are very reasonable.

Contagious: Offers just silkscreened stickers. But they stock 36 pre-mixed Pantone colors, which covers a lot more ground than you might think. They also offer PMS color matching, though I’m not clear if that process involves the premixed colors or just straight up CMYK mixing. The print quality here is great, and the prices per sticker are 1/3 other places. The only catch is that they have a higher minimum quantity. But hey, you get 3x the stickers for the same cost.

I ended up using both printers! Sticker Robot for a digital print, die-cut white sticker on clear vinyl, and Contagious for the two square stickers in flipped colors. The stock colors at Contagious were close enough to what I had specced for Pantone values, so that was an easy switch.

For the square stickers, I decided to get some Loud Room company info printed on the back so that I can hand these out to people like pseudo business cards.

Support from Contagious and Sticker Robot is speedy and outstanding. Both helped me plan my jobs and made good on any problems I had. In the case of Contagious, they offered to split the 1500 quantity in half since my art and colors were the same: 750 yellow on red, and 750 red on yellow.

I highly recommend both companies if you are looking for stickers. Like any print job, I also recommend you reach out and chat with folks who will be producing your job. They are experts and can really help you avoid some traps. Also, order some samples!

Die-Cut Detour Three die-cut stickers for comparison: (A) digital print from Sticker App, (B) silkscreen print from Sticker Robot (with irregular die-cut contour), and (C)digital print from Sticker Robot.

I originally printed the white die-cut sticker with Sticker App because their prices were lowest. When I got the stickers, my heart sank. The print was translucent and the stock felt thin and plastic-y. I decided to try getting them silkscreened at Sticker Robot instead. When I got those, the print and stock felt great, but the die-cut (which was an actual metal die) couldn’t reproduce the contour accurately.

I emailed back to ask if anything could be done, and they kindly reprinted the stickers digitally (which use a laser cut process). These turned out perfect, the print is substantial and more opaque than the Sticker App batch I received, and the die-cut is a crisp contour.

The Competition

I tried or received quotes from these folks, and everyone was great to work with even when I went elsewhere:

Sticker Guy: Good quality and I’d recommend them too! Fun fact: My friends and I ordered stickers from these folks nearly 30 years ago, and they were solid then too.Sticker App: I found the quality lacking compared to Sticker Robot, though they were less expensive.Fat Rat Press: Quoted prices were higher (2x others)Diecut Stickers: Quoted prices were higher (3x others)

My decisions inevitably came down to a balance between price and quality. Contagious, Sticker Robot, and Sticker Guy get my recommendation for your future sticker needs!

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