You have spent real money on a mailer box, an insert card, and a product that is worth the price. Then the customer opens it and the first thing they see is a crumpled sheet of generic white tissue from a pound shop. That moment costs you nothing to fix and it is costing you more than you realise to ignore.

This guide comes from the team at Wabs Print, a London-based packaging supplier that has produced custom tissue paper for UK e-commerce brands and retailers since 2008. We supply 8,500 plus brands, and tissue paper is one of the most underinvested parts of a packaging stack for a simple reason: it is easy to treat as a commodity when it is actually one of the cheapest ways to elevate how a brand lands in a customer’s hands. Wabs Print, based in London, supplies branded tissue paper to businesses across the UK, from e-commerce brands in Glasgow and Nottingham to subscription box operators in Belfast and Edinburgh. By the end of this guide you will know which tissue type suits your brand, what it costs per sheet at your volume, and how the decision connects to the broader unboxing strategy your packaging is trying to build. If you want a price now, branded tissue paper UK will get you a quote within 24 hours. Free design support is included on every order, and delivery is free to any UK address.

What Is Branded Tissue Paper UK?

Branded tissue paper UK is lightweight, acid-free wrapping paper printed with your logo, brand colours, or a repeating pattern, used inside packaging to protect products during shipping and create a premium presentation at the moment a customer opens their order. Unlike standard plain tissue, custom tissue paper UK makes the first thing a customer sees when they open a box part of your brand rather than something interchangeable with every other parcel they have ever received.

The material specification matters more than most buyers realise before they order. Tissue paper is manufactured in weights measured in grams per square metre (gsm). At 17gsm it is genuinely translucent and delicate, the thinnest and most economical option. At 22gsm it holds its shape better when crumpled or layered, which is the most popular weight across our UK customer base for this reason. At 25gsm it has a more substantial drape and opacity, closer in feel to light wrapping paper. All three weights are acid-free, which matters specifically for products with surfaces that can yellow or stain on prolonged contact with acidic paper, including leather goods, delicate textiles, and printed packaging inserts.

The Six Types and What Each One Does

Not all tissue paper decisions are the same, and the right type depends on what your brand is trying to communicate as much as what it is trying to protect.

Plain white tissue is the right starting point if you are testing the effect of tissue paper on your packaging experience before committing to a printed version, since the cost difference per order is small enough that switching from generic to premium plain white often improves presentation noticeably at minimal cost. Solid colour tissue is the next logical step for a brand with a distinctive colour, since matching your tissue to your brand palette creates a cohesive visual before any print is involved. Printed tissue is where the brand statement becomes deliberate, and the choice between 1-colour and full-colour depends on your design complexity rather than your ambition.

Metallic tissue is worth a specific mention for any brand where gifting is a significant share of purchases, since the shimmering finish photographs differently to standard tissue and creates a distinct visual signal that the contents are being presented as a gift rather than a shipment. For luxury packaging more broadly, our luxury packaging finishes guide covers how tissue selection fits within a wider finish strategy that includes foil stamping, soft-touch laminate, and embossing across your box itself.

How Tissue Paper Actually Affects the Unboxing Experience

The case for branded tissue paper is straightforward once you look at it from the customer’s perspective rather than the cost-per-order calculation. When a customer opens a parcel, they form an impression of the brand in the first three seconds before they have read a word of copy or seen the product properly. That impression is set by what they see first and what they touch first. Plain white tissue from a budget supplier communicates nothing. Branded tissue paper communicates everything.

Our own customer data across 8,500 plus UK brands consistently shows that e-commerce brands using custom printed tissue paper see measurable improvements in social media sharing rates and repeat purchase rates compared with plain packaging, primarily because customers who photograph or film their unboxing need something worth photographing. A branded tissue reveal, particularly with a metallic or full-colour printed sheet, creates a visual moment that plain packaging does not.

The practical point for brands deciding whether to invest: tissue paper is one of the few packaging upgrades where the per-order cost increment is genuinely small. A standard order packed with three sheets of 1-colour printed tissue at 1,000 plus unit pricing (£0.20 per sheet) adds £0.60 to the per-order cost. That incremental spend is lower than the cost of most other branding upgrades at any volume, and unlike a box reprint, it can be changed seasonally without reprinting the core box. Our branded mailer boxes guide covers how tissue paper fits within the broader print and finish decision for the box itself, since the two decisions work together as a system rather than independently.

Sizing, GSM, and Print Coverage: Getting the Spec Right

The standard size for most UK e-commerce mailer boxes is 500mm x 750mm (20 x 30 inches), which covers most medium mailer box formats and allows comfortable single-item wrapping or a two-sheet top-and-bottom presentation. For smaller products like jewellery or cosmetics, 375mm x 500mm is more economical since you are not paying for material that gets trimmed or folded under unnecessarily. For large or multi-item orders, 750mm x 1000mm provides full coverage.

Print coverage is the choice that affects cost and visual impact most. Corner logo placement (your logo printed in one corner only) is the most economical printed option since the ink coverage is minimal. Centre logo placement is the most popular, since the logo reads clearly whether the tissue is flat, folded, or crumpled inside a box. Repeating pattern coverage, where the logo or a graphic element tiles across the entire surface, creates the highest visual impact but uses the most ink and therefore costs proportionally more. Edge-to-edge printing, where the entire surface is a solid colour or full-bleed design, is used most often for metallic effects and for brands with a strong graphic identity built around colour rather than logo.

Velvetine Homeware, a lifestyle and home accessories brand based in Glasgow, came to us having never used tissue paper in their packaging. Their average order was two or three items and they had been relying on crumpled kraft packing paper for cushioning. We recommended a 22gsm 1-colour printed tissue in their brand colour with a small repeating logo at corner placement, at £0.20 per sheet at their 1,500 sheet opening order. The cost increase per order worked out at roughly £0.60 across three sheets. Within six weeks of switching, their social media mentions of their packaging had increased noticeably and they received their first unprompted TikTok unboxing video from a customer, which they shared and which drove their highest single-day traffic since launch. They have since moved to a full-colour repeating pattern tissue for their premium range.

Cost and Pricing Guide

All prices below are confirmed from our live tissue paper page and include free UK-wide shipping. Prices are per sheet for the standard 500mm x 750mm size. Larger sizes cost proportionally more based on material area.

There is no minimum order. You can order as few as 50 sheets of plain white tissue or 100 plus sheets of printed tissue as a test before committing to a larger volume. The per-sheet cost drops significantly at 5,000 plus sheets, where ordering a three-month or six-month supply at once typically costs less overall than three or six separate smaller orders. If your artwork is not yet print-ready, our design team can check your file, set up the print artwork, or build the full repeating pattern design from scratch, at no extra charge.

How to Choose: A Decision Framework for Your Brand

Work through these before placing a tissue paper order.

1. Start with the use case, not the aesthetics. If tissue paper is primarily providing cushioning and void fill in a shipping box, 17gsm plain white does that at the lowest cost per sheet. If it is the first visual element a customer sees on opening, the type and print coverage matter proportionally more.
2. Match the tissue to the box. Tissue paper works hardest when it visually connects to the box design, the insert card, or the brand colour used elsewhere in the packaging stack. A tissue in the wrong colour or with a clashing design can work against the unboxing impression rather than contributing to it. Our cosmetic packaging for indie brands guide covers this coordination challenge specifically for beauty and skincare brands where visual coherence across every component is particularly high-stakes.
3. Order your first run smaller than your full estimate. Tissue paper specifications that look right on screen sometimes look different in person, particularly in terms of print brightness, translucency at your chosen gsm, and how the tissue behaves when crumpled or layered. A 500-sheet test before committing to 5,000 sheets costs a little more per sheet but removes the risk of a large order that does not land as expected.
4. Consider seasonal rotation. Tissue paper is one of the cheapest packaging elements to change seasonally, since switching the tissue type or print design does not require reprinting the box. Subscription box brands in particular often use tissue colour or pattern as a deliberate monthly signal that something new is inside, which is a lever that works independently of everything else in the box.

For the broader context of how tissue paper fits into an unboxing strategy from the customer’s perspective, our e-commerce unboxing guide covers the full sequence from outer box through to the product reveal, including the order of elements and how each one contributes to the overall impression. If you are building a sustainable packaging story that includes the tissue as part of your FSC and recyclability credentials, our sustainable food packaging guide covers the certification framework that applies across all FSC-certified materials, not just food packaging. And if tissue is part of a wider e-commerce packaging decision, our e-commerce packaging hub covers how it sits alongside mailer boxes, postal boxes, and other components in a complete packaging stack.

Branded Tissue Paper Delivery Across the UK

Wherever your business is based, lead time and pricing stay identical. An e-commerce brand packing orders from a unit in Belfast works to the same 7 to 10 working day production turnaround as a larger subscription box operation in Edinburgh, and delivery is free to any UK address regardless of order size or tissue type.

We get a steady run of enquiries from independent brands in Nottingham asking specifically whether the print quality on tissue is consistent at small quantities, since at 100 to 500 sheets the per-sheet cost is higher than bulk pricing. The print quality is identical at 100 sheets and 10,000 sheets, since the same production process runs regardless of volume. Whether you are packing from a spare room in Glasgow or a warehouse in Edinburgh, turnaround and pricing are the same, and the no minimum order policy applies across all tissue paper types and sizes.

Compliance and Sustainability for Tissue Paper

All tissue paper we supply is FSC certified from sustainably managed forests, printed with water-based inks that are non-toxic, biodegradable, and safe for direct product contact. From an OPRL recycling labelling perspective, plain, solid colour, and kraft tissue paper all carry an OPRL “Recycle” designation since they are single-material paper. Metallic tissue is the exception: the metallic finish involves a surface treatment that means an OPRL “Check Local Recycling” label is more accurate, since not all local authorities accept metallised paper in kerbside collection.

Tissue paper is classified as paper packaging under UK Extended Producer Responsibility rules and carries a Green RAM rating alongside other paper and board materials, which means it contributes the lowest EPR fee of any packaging material category. It is also one of the most straightforward plastic-free alternatives to plastic bubble wrap and air pillows for product cushioning, which matters for brands making credible sustainability claims to their customers. Under UK Competition and Markets Authority guidelines from April 2025, claims like “plastic-free packaging” require substantiation if tissue paper is used alongside any plastic component in the same order. If your order contains both tissue and a plastic polybag, for example, the plastic-free claim needs qualification. This reflects packaging compliance guidance as of June 2026. Always verify current requirements at gov.uk before making compliance decisions for your business.

FAQ

What is the difference between plain white tissue paper and custom printed tissue paper?

Plain white tissue is unprinted acid-free paper that provides clean, professional product presentation at the lowest possible cost per sheet, starting from £0.04 per sheet at 5,000 plus units. Custom printed tissue paper carries your logo, brand colours, or a repeating pattern, starting from £0.14 per sheet at 5,000 plus units for a 1-colour design. The print decision is about whether the tissue itself should carry brand messaging, not about quality or material, since both are the same acid-free 17 to 22gsm paper.

How many sheets of tissue paper should I use per order?

For small products like jewellery or cosmetics, 2 to 3 sheets. For medium products like clothing or homeware, 3 to 5 sheets. For large or multi-item orders, 5 to 8 sheets. The standard approach is one layer at the bottom of the box before the product, one sheet wrapping the product if it benefits from that, and one to two sheets folded on top as the customer-facing reveal layer.

How much does branded tissue paper cost per order?

At 1,000 plus sheet pricing, a 3-sheet order using 1-colour printed tissue (£0.20 per sheet) costs £0.60 in tissue per order. Using solid colour tissue (£0.11 per sheet) costs £0.33 per order. Plain white (£0.06 per sheet) costs £0.18 per order. Metallic tissue (£0.30 per sheet) costs £0.90 per 3-sheet order. The per-order tissue cost is typically the smallest line item in an e-commerce packaging budget.

Do you deliver custom tissue paper to Glasgow and Belfast?

Yes. Wabs Print delivers custom tissue paper to businesses across the UK, including Glasgow, Belfast, Nottingham, Edinburgh, Newcastle upon Tyne, Cardiff, and London, with free UK-wide shipping on every order regardless of quantity or tissue type. Standard production is 7 to 10 working days from artwork approval.

Is metallic tissue paper recyclable?

Metallic tissue paper carries an OPRL “Check Local Recycling” label rather than a straight “Recycle” label, since the metallic surface treatment is not accepted by all local authorities in UK kerbside collection. Most UK councils now accept metallised paper, but the label accurately reflects that it is not universally accepted in the way plain paper tissue is. Plain, solid colour, and kraft tissue all carry a straightforward OPRL “Recycle” label.

What is the minimum order for custom tissue paper?

No minimum order. You can order 50 sheets of plain white tissue or 100 plus sheets of custom printed tissue for a test before committing to a larger volume. Per-sheet pricing drops significantly at 5,000 plus sheets, which for most UK e-commerce brands represents roughly one to three months of supply depending on order volume.

Can I change my tissue paper design seasonally?

Yes, and this is one of the most cost-effective ways to give an ongoing subscription or repeat-purchase brand a sense of freshness across cycles, since the tissue is cheap to reprint in a new colour or pattern without touching the core box design. Subscription box brands commonly use seasonal tissue colour as a deliberate signal that this month’s box is different from last month’s, which reinforces the value of the subscription without any change to the box itself.

Making the Call

Branded tissue paper UK decisions are simpler than most packaging choices because the cost increment per order is small enough that testing is low-risk. Start plain if you are uncertain, move to solid colour once you know tissue is part of your packaging stack, and move to printed once the brand is confident enough to commit to a repeating design. Metallic earns its place for gifting-led ranges where the visual impact at opening is part of the product’s perceived value.

Whether you are an e-commerce brand in Glasgow, a subscription box in Belfast, or a boutique retailer in Nottingham, Wabs Print delivers custom tissue paper across the UK with no minimum order, free UK-wide shipping, free design support on every order, and the same 7 to 10 working day turnaround regardless of volume. If you are ready to get a price, branded tissue paper UK and you will have a quote within 24 hours.