Kitting: what it is and when to order it together with printing

Kitting: definition and types

The term covers everything that happens to printed items between the press and the recipient – apart from printing and finishing themselves. In other industries (food, cosmetics) similar work is called co-packing or contract packing; here we focus on advertising and promotional materials.

The most common types:

• Set assembly – several different items become one set, e.g. a poster, a wobbler, door stickers and display instructions for a store.
• Inserting – putting flyers, cards or coupons into packaging, catalogues or parcels.
• Banding – bundling stacks of flyers, cards or envelopes with a paper or film band, often with a contents label.
• Unit packing – e.g. folding and bagging clothing or small merchandise in poly bags.
• Labelling and addressing – applying address labels, location numbers, codes.
• Personalisation – named cards, numbered coupons, sets for a specific person.

Often one job combines several of these tasks. On the service side we describe this under personalisation and kitting.

Campaign sets for retail chains

This is the most common case in our work. A chain runs a campaign in dozens or hundreds of locations, and each one gets a different set – depending on store size, window type or country.

In practice:

1. The client provides a list of locations with assigned sets (type A, B, C).
2. We print all the campaign items: vinyl, posters, POS materials.
3. We assemble sets for specific addresses, each labelled with the location number and a contents list.
4. We pack so nothing gets creased – posters in tubes or on a roll, boards on a pallet.
5. We ship by courier or our own transport and report the tracking numbers.

The store manager gets one parcel with everything they need, instead of five deliveries from different sources. More in the description of campaign sets for retail chains and in our guide shipping to many stores.

Gift sets and welcome packs

The second large group is sets for people rather than stores: a welcome pack for a new employee, an end-of-year gift for clients, a conference delegate pack or a race starter pack.

A typical set is a box or bag with a logo, a few merchandise items, a printed card with a greeting or instructions, and sometimes a personalised element – a name on the card or a race number. Most of the work is not the printing but the assembly: each box has to be opened, the contents arranged in the same order, closed and labelled.

Ready gift sets in a box engraved with your logo start from approx. €6 net each for 50 pcs with us (e.g. a pen and a keyring) – details in our branded gift sets offer. Ideas for contents are in our guide gifts for staff and clients.

What kitting costs: example rates

Example: a campaign for 80 stores, each receiving a set of 5 items. Kitting comes to approx. 80 × €3.30 = approx. €265 net, picking for dispatch approx. 80 × €2.80 = approx. €225 net, plus the cost of the shipments themselves. We confirm the exact amount once we receive the list of sets.

When to have the printer do the kitting, and when to do it yourself

You do not always need to outsource it. With 20 sets for the board, your own team will do it in an hour. With 300 parcels of five different items it is several days' work, and on top of that someone has to receive the delivery, unpack it, assemble the sets and book the courier.

Have the printer do it when:
- there are many sets or each one is different (variants, personalisation),
- the items are made by the same printer – they do not need to be moved anywhere,
- the sets go to many addresses,
- you have no space to receive and assemble them.

Do it yourself when:
- there are only a dozen or so sets,
- some of the contents are things you already have and it does not pay to send them to the printer,
- the set needs an element added at the last minute (e.g. a handwritten signature).

You can also split it: we print, assemble and band, and you add one item on site.

How to brief the job and how long it takes

To quote and plan kitting we need:

• a list of set items – what and how many, which ones we print and which you supply (e.g. merchandise from another supplier),
• a list of variants – whether all sets are the same or differ in content,
• a list of addresses in a spreadsheet (name, address, contact, phone, location number),
• the packing method – carton, envelope, tube, pallet; whether the packaging should be neutral, without our logo,
• the delivery date to recipients.

The time depends on the number of sets and their complexity. Kitting happens after printing, so to standard production time (about 3 working days) we usually add a day or several days for large series. For campaigns with a fixed start date we plan everything backwards from that date. If sets are also going abroad, we ship by courier or our own transport across Europe. If materials need to wait for later dispatches, see storage and on-demand shipping.