What is die-cutting?

The die itself is a plywood base with steel rules set into laser-cut slots, following the dieline exactly. Cutting rules are sharpened; creasing rules are rounded; perforating rules alternate teeth and gaps. The whole assembly is clamped into the press and the sheet is pressed against it, so all the geometry happens at once.

After cutting, the waste has to come away. Stripping removes the offcuts — the windows, the gaps between flaps, the trim around the outside — either with stripping tools built into the die or, on short and complex runs, by hand. Blanking then separates the finished blanks from each other. Both steps are labour, which is part of why an intricate shape costs more than a simple one even at the same sheet size.

Register between the print and the cut is the quality measure that matters. If the sheet sits a millimetre out, a window falls off-centre and a border becomes uneven on one side. Press marks printed on the sheet give the die-cutter something to align to, which is why they are added at imposition.

Because the die is a physical tool with a real cost, it is quoted separately from the print and it belongs to the job. Reordering the same size later avoids that cost entirely.