How To Make Stickers and Labels

Sticker Making Tips

Page Layout and Design Tips

• Utilize the borders to your advantage, the fewer cuts you have to make, the less often you will need to clean your tools.  Avoid small sliver cuts, they’re messy.
• To utilize lines on paper cutter rethink your layout.  Using the layout lines on your paper cutter may be the easiest way to cut your custom paper stickers to shape.
• Position carpet tape for easy peeling or score backing with a razor knife.
• Utilize paper cutter to cut strips and scissors for separating and shaping. In most cases your custom paper stickers will not appear side-by-side, therefore they do not need to be identical. 
• Free hand cutting and eye-balling are great time savers. This homemade sticker look is especially effective on handcrafted scrapbook stickers.
• Mark borders for cutting guide.  A small hash mark on the page border may help you align the paper cutter blade.
• Keep double sided tape close to custom sticker edge.  To prevent borders on custom paper stickers from tearing when in use, tape should extend to edges.
• Easy Peel.  For easy double sided tape backing removal, place tape seems near center of custom paper sticker.  On larger custom paper stickers, the seams between tape strips can be as wide as 1/8”.
• Small custom paper stickers may not have a seam on them (space between tape pieces).  To aid in the backing removal, score the backing with a razor knife.  Score them BEFORE you separate them.  Take care not to score all the way through the custom paper sticker.
• Avoid cutting into double sided tape.  If you can position the double sided tape to avoid it when cutting up your custom paper labels, your tools will stay cleaner longer.  Example: If your design calls for an even number of custom paper labels across the page, place the double sided tape on either side of center.  You will avoid the double sided tape when you cut down the center of your custom paper label.
• Using the borders.  If you are using the borders of the page as the edge of your custom paper sticker, place the tape at the edges and work toward the center.  Do the reverse if trimming the borders off.

General Tips on Making Custom Stickers and Labels.

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• Keep your tools clean for a nice clean edge on your custom paper sticker.  Keeping your tools clean will give your homemade stickers a professional look!
• Work with the tape in a cool environment so the glue doesn’t get gooey.
• Recycle news paper ads.  My news paper has fliers from local businesses.  Many of them are printed on florescent paper.  Print your custom paper stickers on the back.
• Recycle refrigerator magnets.  Many companies advertise on refrigerator magnets.  Employ the double sided tape to stick anything to the refrigerator magnets.  Stick a pad of post-it notes on a refrigerator magnet and you have a great shopping list.  Also works on metal doors.
• Consider tape width, the wider the carpet tape, the less you will be handling it.  I use 2” wide carpet tape and design my custom paper sticker sheets.  Your custom paper sticker design may best be served by a 1-½” width.
• Consider tape thickness when purchasing your double sided tape.  Thin clear tape is usually best but if you are experiencing a “ghost” image from the object beneath the custom paper sticker, a thicker opaque double sided tape may be necessary.  Or employ a heavier paper stock. 

• Dollar Store labels may be the cheapest.  I can get 120 2x4” labels for $1.00.  That’s cheaper than building your own.  You can still trim them to the dimensions you want, but they are still white.  Also, they are thin so any underlying images may bleed through.    NOTE: The clear labels I have used did not function in my printer.
• Water resistant.  To make your paper stickers water resistant, coat with an acrylic spray finish.  Test on a discarded sticker for any adverse effects before applying to all.  This will not make your custom stickers water proof.
• When purchasing a paper cutter remember that you will be using mineral spirits to clean off the glue residue.  Review the cleaning a maintenance section in the owner’s manual.  I utilize a Fiskars paper cutter made of plastic with steel cutting edges.