Brand briefs play an important role in label projects. They help align internal teams, communicate brand intent, and set expectations around timelines, budgets, and visual outcomes. From a brand perspective, a clear brief is often seen as the first step toward a smooth execution.
However, even well-prepared briefs can leave gaps. Not because they are poorly written, but because some production realities are not always visible at the brand or packaging level. These gaps tend to surface later during planning, production, or finishing where they influence timelines, costs, and trade-offs in ways that weren’t anticipated.
Understanding what often goes unsaid in brand briefs, and how those omissions affect label production, is key to reducing friction between brand teams and converters.
Why brand briefs exist — and why they matte
At their best, brand briefs are tools for alignment. They bring together inputs from marketing, packaging, procurement, and design, and translate them into a shared direction for execution partners. A good brief reduces ambiguity, accelerates decision-making, and creates confidence across teams.
For label projects in particular, briefs help ensure that brand identity is protected across formats, SKUs, and markets. They provide clarity on visual intent, usage context, timelines, and commercial expectations all of which are essential for planning production.
This is why briefs are so central to brand-side workflows. They are not optional documents; they are foundational. When they work well, they set projects up for success long before files reach a converter.
Where brand briefs tend to focus
Most brand briefs are designed to communicate outcomes. They focus on what the label should look like, how it should represent the brand, and when it needs to be delivered. This makes sense, as these are the aspects most visible and measurable from a brand perspective.
As a result, briefs often emphasise visual elements, brand guidelines, colour references, and overall timelines. Commercial expectations such as target costs or preferred run sizes are also commonly included, especially when procurement teams are involved.
These inputs are essential. They provide direction and context, and they help converters understand the brand’s priorities. However, because briefs are shaped by what brands see and manage internally, they don’t always capture the full set of production considerations that influence how those outcomes are achieved.
What often gets left unsaid
Many of the elements that influence label production sit outside the typical scope of a brand brief. Not because they are unimportant, but because they are often assumed, implicit, or managed elsewhere in the organisation.
For example, briefs may not explicitly address substrate assumptions, finishing expectations, or acceptable tolerances for colour and consistency. Details around how frequently artwork is expected to change, how many versions are likely to be active at the same time, or how approvals will be managed across stakeholders are also not always clear upfront.
From a brand perspective, these factors may feel secondary to visual intent or timelines. From a production perspective, they directly affect planning, material selection, scheduling, and risk. When these considerations remain unstated, they tend to surface later — often when options are narrower and timelines are tighter.
These gaps are rarely the result of oversight. More often, they reflect a disconnect between how brand decisions are framed and how production realities unfold.
How these gaps show up on the shop floor
When key details remain unstated in a brief, they don’t disappear. They resurface during planning and production, where teams have to interpret intent, make assumptions, or seek clarification — often under time pressure.
On the shop floor, this can translate into additional rounds of coordination, rescheduling of jobs, or last-minute adjustments to materials and finishing plans. Production teams may pause work to confirm specifications, or proceed conservatively to avoid risk, both of which can affect timelines and efficiency.
In some cases, the impact is not immediately visible to brand teams. Delays may be absorbed internally, or trade-offs may be made quietly to keep projects moving. Over time, however, these accumulated adjustments influence cost, lead time, and consistency outcomes that brands care deeply about, even if the underlying causes remain unseen.
Why digital workflows don’t eliminate this gap
Digital label printing and connected workflows have made production more flexible. Shorter runs, faster changeovers, and easier versioning have reduced certain barriers that once slowed projects down. From a brand perspective, this flexibility can feel like a safety net.
However, digital workflows don’t remove ambiguity. They respond to decisions; they don’t replace them. When briefs leave key assumptions unstated, digital systems still require teams to interpret intent, confirm details, and manage variability across materials, finishes, and schedules.
In some cases, digital flexibility can even amplify the impact of unclear briefs. As the number of versions, SKUs, or last-minute changes increases, so does the coordination required to keep production aligned. The technology enables movement, but it doesn’t define direction.
This is why the gap between brand intent and production reality can persist even in highly digitised environments.
A clearer way to think about brand briefs
Brand briefs are often treated as documents something to be completed, shared, and signed off. In practice, they function more like starting points. They initiate conversations that continue as production realities take shape.
When briefs are viewed this way, gaps become easier to address. Questions around materials, finishing, versioning, and approvals are no longer seen as interruptions, but as part of aligning intent with execution. This alignment benefits both sides: brands gain predictability and consistency, while converters can plan and deliver more effectively.
Clearer outcomes don’t come from more detailed briefs alone. They come from shared understanding. When brand decisions are framed with an awareness of how production actually works, the gap between expectation and reality narrows and label projects move forward with fewer surprises.