Pallet Labels
A pallet label is read from across an aisle, by a scanner held at arm’s length from a forklift, in a building that is often cold, dusty and badly lit. Everything follows from that: it is large, its barcode is generous, and it has to stay stuck to stretch wrap or corrugated board for as long as the load is in the system. Etiquette Systems makes pallet labels to order — blank stock you print in-house, or fully printed by us — on rolls or sheets.
Start with the surface
Three surfaces cover almost every pallet and they behave nothing alike. Stretch wrap is a low-surface-energy film that keeps moving under the label, so it needs an aggressive, high-tack adhesive and a facestock flexible enough to follow it. Corrugated board looks easy and is not: recycled kraft is dusty and porous, and a general-purpose adhesive can be lifting at the corners a week later. The wooden pallet itself is rough and often damp — durable-label territory. Tell us which one you are labelling and the adhesive choice largely makes itself.
Cold store changes the rules
Two temperatures matter and they are not the same number. Service temperature is how cold the label gets once applied; application temperature is how cold the surface was when it went on. An adhesive can be perfectly happy at −20°F and still refuse to grab an already-frozen carton. If labels go on inside the freezer, or onto product straight out of a blast tunnel, say so — that is a different adhesive, and one we stock, down to −65°F. Condensation matters too: a pallet moving from freezer to warm dock wets every surface on it, so the label needs to be down and keyed before that happens.
A barcode that scans first time
Scan distance is set by the width of the narrowest bar, so a code meant to be read at ten or fifteen feet needs a wider X-dimension, and that is why pallet labels are big. Keep the quiet zones either side of the code genuinely clear — no rules, no artwork, no die-cut edge crowding them — and keep contrast honest: dark bars on white, and no gloss laminate to throw the scanner’s own light back at it. GS1’s logistics-label guidance puts the label low on the load, roughly 400–800 mm from the base, clear of the vertical edges and on two adjacent faces so a driver can read it from either aisle. If you ship to a retailer or 3PL, their spec is the one that counts — check it before you print.
Print them yourself, or have us print them
Most warehouses print pallet labels on demand, because the data changes with every load. Thermal transfer with a resin or wax-resin ribbon is the sturdy choice: it survives handling and cold far better than direct thermal, which fades with heat, light and abrasion. Laser printing off 8.5″ x 11″ sheets suits lower volumes. The other option is a hybrid: we preprint your graphics and a colour-coded border on the press, leave a clean panel for the variable data, and you fill it in on your own printer — colour identifiers earn their keep when a bay or a route has to be read at a glance.
Formats and quantities
4″ x 6″ is the workhorse size and the one most industrial printers are set up for; other sizes and shapes are cut to order, on rolls wound to suit your printer or applicator, or on sheets. Send us the surface, the temperature, the printer and the quantity and we will quote it — blank or custom printed, short runs included.
Popular label formats
Rolls, sheets and die-cut shapes — paper, coated paper, waterproof poly and more.
Need custom pallet labels?
Tell us your product, size and quantity — we'll recommend the right material and send free samples.