Mockup

Example

A beekeeper is changing the label on a 250 g jar. Before ordering, they get a mockup: the same jar from three angles with the new label wrapped to the curve of the glass, plus a second frame of six jars on a shelf beside competing brands. That is where the flat artwork stops hiding things: the lid eats the top 4 mm of the label, the name reads from a metre away but the weight does not, and the jar disappears on the shelf because the background is the same yellow as its neighbours. Three revisions later the label goes to the printer. The mockup is an afternoon; a wrong print run is another print run.

Why it matters for a business

A mockup moves the discussion from taste to facts — everyone looks at one image and talks about the product rather than the file. It is useful beyond approval too: it goes into a pitch to a retail chain, into a catalogue, into a post, before the product physically exists. It also has a limit. A mockup is a rendering: it does not prove how the colour will sit on the actual stock, or how foil, varnish and relief will behave. A press proof and a physical sample do that. One more rule: a product page in an online shop needs a photograph of the real item, and a mockup is not a substitute for it.

What to ask

• Is the mockup built on the real dieline, or on a stock template with different proportions?
• Does it show the special finishes — foil, varnish, relief — and how they read in different light?
• How many views and how many revisions are included?
• Will there be a physical sample from the printer before the run?
• Who owns the scene or the photograph, if the mockup will be used in advertising?

Mockups for labels and boxes come with the work we do on packaging and labels.