Vinyl stickers explained: contour cutting, surfaces and ordering

Contour cut, kiss-cut, die-cut: what the terms mean

Four terms get mixed up constantly, although they describe two different things: the shape of the cut line and the depth of the cut.

Our vinyl stickers are contour cut, following your design exactly, and they are cut individually: every sticker arrives on its own, ready cut, not as a sheet you still have to peel or trim. A narrow border runs around the design. It calms the contour down and absorbs small tolerances during cutting. You set the colour and the width of that border yourself, in the designer under “Contour”.

Not to be confused with the CutContour on our CUT transfers for textiles. There you create the cut line in your file yourself, on vinyl stickers our system does it for you. How a CutContour is built is explained in Creating a CutContour.

Shape, border and size: what you can set

You upload your design on the product page and set everything else in the designer:

• Cut shape: contour cut along your design, or round, rectangular and rectangular with rounded corners if you prefer a calm standard shape.
• Distance to the cut line: tight at 1.5 mm, medium at 3 mm or wide at 5 mm. That is how wide the border around your design becomes. Tight looks precise, wide makes delicate designs more robust. The colour of the border is set in the “Contour” tool, white is the classic, but it does not have to be.
• Size: from 40 x 40 mm, either from the presets or as a free size. The sheet width of 1200 mm sets the upper limit, so everything from a small logo to a window sticker is possible.
• Enclosed areas: you decide whether enclosed areas inside your design are printed as well, for example the space inside the letter O.
• Project check: before you finish, the designer shows your design with the cut line, the safe area and the bleed. Take another look there before you add it to your basket.

Several designs in one order are no problem: you create them one after another and see them side by side in the overview.

Four versions: white or transparent, matt or gloss

You choose the vinyl and the laminate through the product, not in the designer. Four versions are available, all from €0.54 each:

White on transparent vinyl

On the transparent versions you decide in the designer, under “White print”, how your design should look:

• No white: translucent like window film. The surface shows through the colours and white areas stay see-through.
• White behind the design: white sits under everything that is printed. The colours stay opaque, white areas really do come out white, and the vinyl around them stays clear.

White is a second print pass and costs 20 per cent extra. The versions on white vinyl do not offer this choice, as your design already sits on white there.

Matt or gloss is purely a question of surface: both are protective laminates over the print. Gloss pushes the colours forward, matt takes out reflections and makes lettering easier on the eye.

What vinyl stickers stick to

Vinyl likes smooth, clean and dry surfaces. The smoother the surface, the better it holds:

• Prepare the surface: dust, grease and cleaning residue stop the sticker from holding. Wiping it once with a little alcohol and letting it dry is usually enough.
• From the middle outwards: place the sticker in the middle and smooth it outwards, then no bubbles are left behind.
• Check a small run first: on a new surface, stick one single piece on and look at it again a few days later.

Weatherproof, but without a promise in years

Our vinyl stickers are waterproof, weatherproof, UV-resistant and scratch-resistant, and the laminate sits as a protective layer over the print. How long a sticker still looks new outdoors depends on where it sits: a south facing wall, salt, a pressure washer and daily rubbing are something else than a laptop lid in an office. That is why you will not find a number of years here. If you need a statement for your customer, use the location as your yardstick and test on site once.

Adding stickers to your own range

Stickers are a good add-on sale if you already decorate textiles: same customer, same file, different product. There are four things worth knowing first.

1. Understanding quantities

Printing and cutting happen on a sheet. The designer therefore places your design side by side as often as it fits across the sheet width and suggests exactly that quantity, so no material goes to waste. For your customer that means a single small sticker costs as much as the first sensible quantity, and the smaller the design, the more stickers fit on the same area.

2. Promising what you can keep

• What you can promise: waterproof, weatherproof, UV-resistant, scratch-resistant, contour cut to the exact shape, production in 2 to 5 working days.
• What you leave open: a fixed lifespan in years, dishwashers, food contact and any surface you have not tested.
• What helps in a conversation: a sample. Order a small set with a new customer's logo first, it convinces faster than any description.

3. Keeping your range small

Four versions sound like a lot of choice, but two are usually enough when you talk to a customer: white gloss for anything that should stand out, and transparent for glass. Add matt when lettering is involved or the surface must not reflect. If you cannot decide, order a small set in two versions and put them next to each other.

4. Choosing the right product

Not every job is a vinyl job. Textiles need a DTF transfer, and for a smooth surface that should feel printed rather than covered, rub-on stickers made from UV-DTF are the better choice, because no film stays on top. Vinyl plays to its strengths when things need to be robust, weatherproof and quick. Which product suits which job is shown in Which product suits my project?

Your customer's file: what it needs to do

You do not need a finished print template, but you do need a clean file:

• Cut out: a PNG with a transparent background, or a PDF in which the background is genuinely open. Everything visible in the file gets printed, including a white box behind the logo.
• 300 dpi at final size: a small image from the web is not enough for a large sticker.
• At least 40 x 40 mm: it does not go smaller, and fine detail needs some space anyway.
• Using transparency: on transparent vinyl everything without colour stays open. If it needs to be opaque there, have your design backed with white in the designer.
• Grey areas from the colour chart: a grey mixed from all colours easily picks up a cast in print. Take a value from our colour chart instead, more on that in Grey tones in the DTF printing process.
• No cut line needed: our system creates it.

How to export correctly from Illustrator, Photoshop, CorelDRAW, Affinity or Canva is covered in Exporting your files correctly. Why a logo as a vector is worth more than a screenshot is explained in Pixels and vectors compared. The most common pitfalls are collected in The most common mistakes and how to fix them.

Frequently asked questions

View gloss vinyl stickersAll stickersView UV-DTFPrint data

Also useful: Preparing your print data, Contact and FAQ.

Related articles

Good luck with your stickers

DTF-King Team