creative alternatives to cd packaging services?

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cello_pudding

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creative/cheap.

one band i know put their cd into a paper bag, put a stamp on it, put some twin around it, and put their name on it. very creative.

.41 for the stamp...3 cents for each bag (1200 for 37 bucks), and twine has to be even cheaper.

then you can get the cd's for 10 cents. and bring each unit down to about 60 cents max.

what i want to do in this thread is to brainstorm and share interesting packaging methods you've seen before.

I've also seen a cd that was printed with a stencil and spray paint. bad thing is that the cd didn't always play...the method could probably be tweaked though.



l_555aa5d667e8d84e5d154f7891a5f58a.jpg
 
60 cents is kinda pricey.

You can get professionally replicated cd's in a cardboard sleeve printed in full color and shrink wrapped for about 70-80 cents.

I'd either go that route, or burn a bunch and write your band website on it in sharpie and give them away.
 
cello_pudding said:
[citation needed]
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huh ?


http://www.nationwidedisc.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=84&Itemid=134

.84 cents. I've seen specials for 700 or so for 1000 cd's. I'll try and find one.

To me, I'd either shoot to "look pro", or take the cheapest route possible and go for the "struggling artist" look. Really, CD replication is fairly cheap. If you sold them for even $7 you only have to sell 100 to break even. If you don't think you'll sell 100, then I'd burn 'em, mark 'em with a sharpie and call it good.

edit - dammit - I cant find the deal I saw not too long ago, but everywhere has full retail cd's in jewel cases for between $900-1000. We just did 1000 cd's with full color silkscreening on the disc, full color 6 page fold-out insert, in a jewel case, with barcode and shrinkwrapped for $1250. It looks 100% like a commercial CD. 100%. At $10 a pop, it will only take 125 to break even on the cd's. Like I said, you can find the 3 color cd in a full color jacket for much less.......
 
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i see.

the thing about the diy way is that you can make 20...you can make 200...

but...1000 up front at 70 cents is not always in the musician budget
 
ahhh yes..

there definately is something about cd artwork done by hand.. I've done this many times.

It's alot of work and doesn't end up being much cheaper.. but sometimes it can be cool
 
get some heavy card stock... download a template to make a foldable cd jacket... then go to a print shop, have them dupe you off however many copies on your card stock (it's SUPER cheap), then cut all of them out, fold them...glue them together with super glue and let dry... there you have a very DIY cd sleeve that cost hardly anything to make, and will fetch for huge bucks on ebay once you become rich and famous.
 
cello_pudding said:
i see.

the thing about the diy way is that you can make 20...you can make 200...

but...1000 up front at 70 cents is not always in the musician budget
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yep...especially when it's a ltd edition release, it costs up the ass to have professionally done.

we did a 200 copy ltd edition remix EP, and it just would have been insane to get them professionally done for 200 copies...so we all did them by hand, hand numbered the lot of them.. :) Only thing that sucks though, is I left them in my car and the car window was broken, so they got rained on and fucked...got to print up some new ones and decommission the old ones :(
 
NL5 said:
To me, I'd either shoot to "look pro", or take the cheapest route possible and go for the "struggling artist" look.
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That's something I've done a lot of thinking about and I do agree. I think that you should either make it look really professionally released, or exploit the DIY thing and make it very stylized that way. We did our EP with literally just a black and white copy machine, the ink sometimes can even come off slightly on your fingers, but I think that's kind of neat in a way, it has a very stylized look to it, that I think if we went somewhere middle of the road would have looked a bit odd.
 
Although far from cheap, I always thought it'd be a cool idea to get a bunch of the cheapest usb drives you can find, and load them up with FLAC & 320kbps mp3's, as well as live videos and stuff, and sell them for like $1 more than what you paid for them.

Here's 2 512mb drives for $10 (http://www.overstock.com/Electronic...SB-Flash-Drive-Case-of-2/3047131/product.html)

At $10/drive, you'd be doubling your money, and people would get a usb stick as well as freely copyable files!
 
TerraMortim said:
yep...especially when it's a ltd edition release, it costs up the ass to have professionally done.

we did a 200 copy ltd edition remix EP, and it just would have been insane to get them professionally done for 200 copies...so we all did them by hand, hand numbered the lot of them.. :) Only thing that sucks though, is I left them in my car and the car window was broken, so they got rained on and fucked...got to print up some new ones and decommission the old ones :(
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My point is though, if you can sell 200 at even $10, that more than pays for fully pro replication. A band I just produced spent about $1200 for full color CD, with full color 6 page insert. Under the cd inside the tray is a pic. It looks 100% pro, and they sold enough to pay for the repro in the first week.

If you don't think you'll sell at least 100, then I would for sure just burn them and hand them out - like I said, go for the struggling artist route, and ask for a donation if they want to give it, or just take the album for free. You'll be surprised how much drunk people in a bar will "donate" sometimes. :)
 
well for large quantaties and ease replication is by far the way to go..

but like I said you can make more of an impact if you do something completely different..

I like the usb stick idea.. that's neat.. or unique packaging. something different. Especially if you're not on a label or have any distribution.. put on a great show and have something interesting that no one has seen before and you'll sell records and get some word of mouth.. I would likely talk to my friends about the band I saw selling usb sticks over the normal cd I just bought.
 
So i think i'm going to do some lenonlium printing on old cereal boxes.

I'll ask around for the boxes, cut them to size, and use the box edging for the hinge.

I bought some printing material today to cut my originals. i just have to remember to do my lettering backwards.

I have a lot of time free on train rides where i go to give guitar lessons, so this project should be good fun.
 
i cut my linoleum on the train haha.

i was ironing and cutting and throwing away my shavings. it was kinda funny to do.

i first made an to-size drawing of what i wanted, sectioned it off and decided what i wanted to be brown, blue, and green.

i put the drawing over each linoleum block and made small holes on the lines i drew.

and then i cut each block differently so that when overlayed, there would be different colors in different areas.

i could only make 10 because the amount of cardboard that i've gotten was only a couple of box tops. this sunday night when it's recycling day i should be able to rummage around and get some.

it's a nice art project
 
ok...i don't have a nice camera...and the colors are off on this...but...you get the idea

fincdai6.jpg
 
Ha, ha. That looks pretty cool. Are you printing the CD's the same way as the sleeves?

Don't really understand the linoleum printing technique you're using? Explain please. :D
 
you have linoleum, a tool to carve it...what ever you don't cut out will be colored.

cuttingtheblock1.gif


you take this, put ink on it, and stamp it on something.

because i wanted 2 ink colors, i used 2 blocks for the front, and one for the back.
 
We usually used the cheap-o CD-R/paper sleeve/sharpie for 2 or 3 song handouts at shows, etc. Put the band name, track name, and website URL on the disc and sleeve. It seemed to generate website traffic according to the guestbook (remember those?). We could get rid of about 50 of them after a 45 minute set at a multi-band show. We always ran out of them at bar gigs... we probably couldn't have sold them, though. We also put cheap-o 10c stickers in with them sometimes.

CD replication is good if you absolutely think you neeeed to do it. I vote for creative until you're spending too much time making CD's, and/or until there is a demand for them.

You can do a lot with Kinko's and jewel cases, I think though. I've seen some good ones. I like the paper bag idea, I've never heard of it before. If you felt so inclined to make fliers for the next show, you could wrap the CD in the flier and use it as a sleeve if you designed it creatively.
 
steve.h said:
Although far from cheap, I always thought it'd be a cool idea to get a bunch of the cheapest usb drives you can find, and load them up with FLAC & 320kbps mp3's, as well as live videos and stuff, and sell them for like $1 more than what you paid for them.

Here's 2 512mb drives for $10 (http://www.overstock.com/Electronic...SB-Flash-Drive-Case-of-2/3047131/product.html)

At $10/drive, you'd be doubling your money, and people would get a usb stick as well as freely copyable files!
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that would be cool and innovative, if it hadn't already been done

did you know it had or did you truely think you were the first to think of it???
 
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