Ink on the glass that matches your brand colors and handles full-color, multi-color logos.
Screen printing lays your logo onto the glass in the actual colors of your brand, which is the method to choose when color is part of who you are.
Screen printing pushes ink through a stencil onto the surface of the glass, one color at a time. Because it uses real ink, it can match a specific PMS color and reproduce art that carries two, three, or more colors. A brewery whose can art is built on a particular green, or a logo with a colored icon next to black text, comes out on the glass looking like the brand it is meant to represent. Laser engraving cannot do this, since an etched mark is always a single frosted tone.
This is the deciding factor most of the time. If your identity is tied to a color, printing is how that color ends up on the glass.
A printed logo is cured so it bonds to the glass and stands up to regular washing. For a bar running a high-heat commercial dishwasher day after day, print holds up well, though over a very long service life an etched mark is the more bulletproof option since there is nothing on the surface to wear. For most uses — events, retail, gift glasses, and normal bar rotation — printing lasts as long as you need it to. Hand washing or a standard dishwasher cycle is gentle on it, and the color stays true.
Printing shines on flat, open glasses with room for a sizable logo. Pint glasses are the classic example: a wide face, a big printable area, and a shape that bars order by the case. It is the right call for any large logo, for full-color art, and for anything multi-color where engraving would flatten the design into one tone. Breweries print far more than they engrave for exactly this reason, since the glass is meant to echo the can or the tap handle.
Send a vector file when you can — AI, EPS, or high-resolution PDF — so each color separates cleanly. Our artwork requirements page covers how to set up multi-color art and which formats print best.
Choose laser engraving when you want the etched, frosted look and your logo works in a single tone. Whiskey rocks glasses and Glencairns usually go that way, because the understated etched mark suits spirits service and engraving cannot fade no matter how many wash cycles it sees. Metal items like flasks and tumblers are engraved too, since they cannot be screen printed at all. For a single-color wordmark on a rocks glass, engraving often looks better than print and lasts indefinitely.
If your logo could go either way, the question is simple: do you need the brand color, or do you want the etched look? Color points to print; a single-tone etch points to engraving.
Send your artwork and the glasses you have in mind, and we will tell you how it prints. Start a quote when you are ready.
Send us the pieces and quantities you need and we’ll come back with per-case and per-unit pricing.