Food and Beverage Box Spec Sheet: Sizes, Board Types, Print Options and Order Quantities

This page is for buyers who already know what goes inside the box and are stuck on what to write on the specification sheet. We make food and beverage packaging in Xiamen from kraft board, white board and corrugated sheets. Our food and beverage collection lists 155 product pages at the time of writing, and this is what we need before we can put a firm number on a quote.

TL;DR

• The collection is nine groups of paper packaging that touch food: 90 produce and cold-chain cartons, 43 mixed food and beverage boxes, 21 cake, sushi and sandwich boxes, 16 pizza boxes and 11 bag-in-box beverage lines, plus four smaller groups.
• A quote runs on five fields: internal L×W×H, board and flute, print and finish, quantity, and destination country. Leave one out and we quote a range instead of a number.
• Sampling is 7 days and mass production is 15 days from artwork and die approval, and a quote stays valid 7 days. The general order quantity printed on 72 of these product pages is 500 pcs.

What this collection actually contains

The collection is not one product line. It gathers nine groups of paper packaging that share a single requirement: they touch food or drink. Counts below were taken from the food and beverage collection on 24 September 2026.

Sizes we already publish, and why we still ask for yours

In food packaging the format follows the product, so most sizes we build are already on the product pages. A 5 kg banana carton is not a 5 lb blueberry carton. Use the table to see whether your product is close to a die we own, then send your own internal dimensions anyway.

Two habits cost buyers a revision round. The first is sending external dimensions instead of internal ones: a carton that measures 245 mm outside does not hold a 245 mm product, because the gap is the board plus the fold. The second is copying a competitor's box. We quote to internal dimensions and a die we cut ourselves, so the lid depth or glue flap will not land exactly where their die put it. If your product has to drop into a retail tray with almost no clearance, send the tray itself, because a photograph will not tell us the clearance. The hexagon pizza box is the format buyers most often arrive with as a photo.

Board, flute and what paper will not do

We quote kraft board, white board and CCNB/grayboard, with corrugated flute in E, B, C and BC, plus heavy-duty boards held for high stacking in long sea freight. That list is published on our food and beverage product pages rather than written for this article. Board choice follows the load path: a pizza box closed hot wants a thin sheet that scores without cracking, so these pizza boxes are built in E flute and several are lined with aluminium foil. A banana carton that sits in a reefer wants a heavier wall and a vent pattern that moves air through the load.

Hexagon kraft pizza box, built from 6 in to 12 in in E flute. Product photo, Birtleypack.

Here is where we push back. If your product is oily, wet, or needs a barrier measured in months rather than days, a paperboard box on its own is the wrong answer; you need a liner, a coated board or a different format, and we would rather say that before quoting than after a failed trial. The same caution applies to the word recyclable. Deep-waxed or laminated boards are engineered for damp and refrigerated conditions, and heavily coated structures may carry specific recycling requirements where you sell. Regulation (EU) 2025/40 sets the EU packaging framework and places its duties on the company putting packaging on that market; we have not found a clause that singles out a paper finish for a flat ban, so check the current position for your market before printing a recyclability claim on the box.

For strength numbers, ask. We run ECT (edge crush), Mullen burst and compression testing on request, and the results can travel with the quote pack.

Print and finish options

We print by offset, flexo and digital, and finish with matte or gloss varnish, lamination, foil stamping, embossing and debossing, and spot UV. Those are the options listed on our food and beverage pages; the right one follows the artwork and the run rather than a preference list. The pizza box range is where buyers usually discover this, because a delivery box shows every fold under a heat lamp.

Send artwork as vector (AI, PDF or EPS) with fonts outlined, the colour references you will hold us to, and a note of which panels are printed. A full-bleed photograph across a corrugated panel is the request that most often comes back with a question: flexo printing onto kraft board will not reproduce fine photographic gradients, and if that image is essential, plan for a laminated sheet or an offset-printed label instead. On a bag-in-box carton the same panel carries a brand and a fill level, so draw the artwork for the size before we print it.

Order quantity, sampling and production timing

These are our standing figures, checked against the product pages on 24 September 2026. They are not per-size promises: a structure we have never cut can move them.

One caveat: some older product pages still carry an earlier sample and production line from an older template. Quote against 7 days for the sample and 15 days for production from artwork and die approval; if a page shows a different figure, ask us to confirm it against your order.

Not every enquiry fits us, and it is cheaper to say so early. Our general order quantity is 500 pieces, so if you need a hundred boxes for a market test, a stock mailer from a local printer will be faster and cheaper than a die we would have to cut for you. If you ship a full container of produce every month, we can hold the tool and repeat the same die across seasons.

Banana export carton offered in 5 kg, 10 kg, 20 kg and 25 kg. Product photo, Birtleypack.

What we send back after you send the five fields

With those five fields in hand we return a dieline drawing, a quote on the term you asked for, a sample date and a production date, with payment by T/T under our standard terms. If the job uses a size we have not made before, the die is cut and the sample approved before production starts. That is the moment when a wrong internal dimension is still cheap to correct; after the run it is a full print quantity of board. Our food and beverage articles cover the sizing and cost questions that come up earlier.

Frequently asked questions

What is the minimum order quantity for food and beverage boxes? The general order quantity printed on 72 of these product pages is 500 pcs. Folding and corrugated boxes are quoted from 500 to 1,000 units and rigid boxes from 300 to 1,000 units, because the figure moves with size, structure and print run.

Which board and flute options can you supply? Kraft board, white board and CCNB/grayboard in E, B, C and BC flute, plus heavy-duty boards for high-stacking sea freight.

Can you make a size that is not listed? Yes. A custom internal size is a normal request; send L×W×H in mm or inches plus what the box has to hold, and we will confirm whether an existing die is close enough to save tooling.

How long do a sample and a production run take? Seven days for the sample and fifteen days for production, both counted from approval of artwork and the dieline. Freight and booking schedules are separate from those figures.

How long is a quote valid? Seven days from the date we issue it. After that we re-quote, because board and freight both move.

Do you test the box before it ships? On request we run ECT, Mullen burst and compression tests and pass the results with the quote.

What exactly do you need from me to quote? Five fields: internal L×W×H, board and flute, printing and finish, order quantity, and the destination country. Print coverage and artwork files help us make the first answer a firm one.

Sources

• Birtleypack, Food And Beverage Boxes collection and the product pages named above (style counts, published sizes, board and flute options, MOQ wording, shipping terms) — birtleypack.com, counted and checked 24 September 2026.
• EUR-Lex, Regulation (EU) 2025/40 on packaging and packaging waste — checked 24 September 2026.
• European Commission, Packaging waste topic page — checked 24 September 2026.
• Sample, production and quotation validity windows confirmed with our export team on 22 September 2026.

Last verified: 24 September 2026, Birtleypack content desk (Xiamen Birtley Industry & Trading Co., Ltd.).