The Easiest & Cheapest Way To Print Cottage bakery Labels!

Hey Besties! I get SO many questions from bakery owners on the easiest, cheapest and best way to print their cottage bakery labels! And I’m so excited to share my recommendations with you! If you’ve been here before, you know I’m all about helping you, as small business owners, maximize your time and increase your profit margins. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – the best way to give yourself a raise is to cut your expenses! All those seemingly little costs really add up when you’re running a bakery and when profit margins are already tight, every bit counts! And if you’re like me, raising your prices is not always the best way to increase your profit. So, let’s dive into how printing your cottage bakery labels can save you tons of time and let you keep more of your own dough!

The Importance of Labels!

It’s safe to say that as a bakery business owner, you are required to label your products to comply with cottage bakery laws. And each state is slightly different in what is required on those labels, which is why it can get confusing and overwhelming. But as a cottage bakery owner, it is your responsibility to understand your state’s labeling requirements. If you’re not sure what needs to be included, you should definitely read your state’s cottage bakery regulations or connect with someone from the governing organization.

But labeling also goes way beyond the required ingredient labels. It’s not uncommon for bakeries to have 2 or 3 different labels on a package! Many bakeries include flavor labels, thank you labels, or other promotional labeling to spruce up their packaging. And this is where labeling can get really fun! You may also have a need for shipping labels, organizational labels and many other things!

You know what’s not fun? Ordering your labels and having to wait for them to arrive! Not only is this FAR more costly, but it REALLY limits your ability to make label updates at your own convenience. We are making label changes all the time to create different flavors, seasonal labels and so much more. It would CRIPPLE us and force us to raise our prices if we had to purchase our labels and wait. Thankfully, you’ve got much better options!

How we used to make our labels

Here’s the deal…I’ve always been very transparent about this…I have a short fuse when it comes to electronics. 😆 I’m normally a very patient, chill person, but NOTHING sets me off like a piece of technology that’s not cooperating! Ask my family, it’s my kryptonite. So when my daughter started her bakery biz (she was 13), I started creating her labels using Avery.com, which was easy to use! I could simply create any label on wanted using one of their templates, purchase the corresponding labels and print them using our home printer. But here’s the thing…printing them took forever, one sheet at a time. When she needed hundreds of labels, I was literally camped out by the printer for LONG periods of time…it was painful. But the labels only cost about 7-10 cents apiece, which seemed like a great price.

But besties, you know…time is money and this was taking way too much time. If you only need to print very small numbers of labels each year, then it would make sense. But we had far outgrown this option. And I’m SO happy we found a better way.

Enter my Munbyn Printer for Cottage Bakery Labels

Thermal printers started becoming really popular a few years ago, for good reason! One of the biggest benefits is that thermal printers don’t require any ink. You read that right, the magical thermal printing process does not require any ink, so the only cost associated with using a thermal printer, is the labels. For those of us who LOATHE buying ink, this is a game changer.

The other amazing benefit is that you can print labels incredibly fast! You can print labels in a matter of seconds, seriously. If you read the previous section, this is what I needed in my life!

Now let’s talk cost. I purchased THIS Munbyn printer and label holder for $90. And because I wanted to make several different styles of labels, I purchased three different kinds, which I’ll get into more below. But for the simple 2″ round circle labels, they come out to 1 cent each. 1 cent! I’m sorry, what? Did I just cut my printing label printing costs by 90%? Yes, that’s exactly what I did. So previously, I spent about $10 to print 100 labels and now I’m spending $1.

I literally told my family, “This is the best thing since sliced bread”. I can save myself a ton of time AND save a ton of money? Done! Now I LOVE making labels, I’m having so much fun with all kinds of designs, all while saving time and money. It’s a bakery business owner’s dream.

How Do you create your labels

Now you may recall earlier in this blog post where I talked about my aversion to new electronics. So naturally, I took a deep breath opening up my Munbyn thermal printer box and hoped for the best. Bestie, when I tell you that I not only had that printer set up but had designed a custom label and had printed it in under 5 minutes, I’m not even being dramatic. Here is the label I created and printed in less than 5 minutes from taking this thing out of the box.

And then because my mind was so BLOWN and I was so excited, I created this and printed this label because I was so excited to show you! 😂

The Munbyn app literally has tons of free templates that you can simply use and print, modify or create your own custom labels. You do not need any fancy graphic design skills to create your own labels. That said, I do like to play around with Canva designs and personally prefer to design more intricate labels on my computer. So, you’ve got options! You can create and print all your labels within the Munbyn app, or you can design your labels on any program you like and still print them from your Munbyn printer! You are not limited in any way in where or how you create your labels, but Munbyn does make it really easy from their app for those who want to make it really easy.

Here are two sample labels I created on Canva and you’ll see what those look like once printed later on as well!

Munbyn printer video and labels

I knew I wanted to be able to make several different types of labels for different packaging purposes, so I bought these three rolls of labels.

Basic 2″ white, circle labels, which you’ll find HERE.

Flower thermal labels in 2.25″ size, which you’ll find HERE.

And these holographic 2″ circle labels, you’ll find HERE.

Munbyn, and other thermal label companies, offer an endless variety of label sizes, colors, finishes and more. Munbyn claims their brand thermal labels are the best for their printer, but we’ll be continuing to test different kinds to find our favorites. The most important piece is that you are buying THERMAL labels…this is key to the printing technology.

I’ll also add that thermal printing only prints in black. It does not print in color, hence why you bring in the fun with the actual label designs and colors.

For you to see just how amazing and quick this printer is, you’ll find a quick demo video HERE, where I printed the above sample labels!

Munbyn Printer Quality

Let’s take a close-up look at the quality of the Munbyn printing! The video linked just above shows many angles and close-up quality results too.

Opportunities for Improvement

I always give it to you straight, Besties, because well, that’s what Besties do. And while I am in LOVE with making labels now, there are a couple things that would make me love it even more. First, sometimes really small font can be a little unclear. It looked pretty good on all these labels, but just something to consider if your labels include a lot of really tiny font. I think it’s more the nature of the thermal printing technology, but hopefully that will improve.

Secondly, when I switched labels, sometimes I’d have to adjust my “offset settings” in the app to ensure the label was perfectly centered. Not a huge deal, but something I did have to play around with which would be nice to eliminate. But these are really the only couple things where I see room for improvement.

A win for cottage bakery labels

For our bakery, this has become hands down, the best way to easily print our labels while saving time and money. It has been a game changer for us and I’m so excited to level-up our packaging at the same time! I can confidently recommend this method for printing and managing cottage bakery labels for fellow home bakers! In summary, here are the products we’re using, LOVE and recommend.

The Munbyn printer we LOVE! It’s Bluetooth so I print wirelessly from my phone! And while I chose white, there are also super cute colors options too.

The label holder, which in my opinion in essential. This allows your roll of labels to spin effortlessly while rapidly printing off your labels!

The 2″ white circle labels that we use for our ingredient labels! Also available in a variety of other sizes to meet your needs.

And we are loving the flower labels and holographic labels as well! All printed with beautiful quality!

Free Label Designs Coming for YOU!

You know I LOVE to share free printables with my Besties! So in addition to the royal icing transfer sheets, cookie cards, DIY kit instruction cards and tags, you’ll soon see fun label designs that you’ll be able to download and use with your thermal printer too!

On that note, if you’re not already subscribed to receive my weekly newsletter, now is your chance! Many of my free printables are only available in the newsletters, so you don’t want to miss out! Happy Baking, Bestie!