A design and print project for Emilios, Sale

Every takeaway wants customers to post about them. Very few give them a reason to.

That was the thinking behind the pizza boxes we designed and printed for Emilios — a Sale takeaway serving fish and chips, pizzas and kebabs since 1990. Thirty-five years of trading builds the kind of local reputation money cannot buy. The question was how to get that reputation onto social media without paying for it.

The idea: make the box the photo

The standout feature is a tear-out panel in the lid.

Lift it out and you get a hand-held photo prop: an illustrated character in a black Emilio's Pizza t-shirt, arms raised, against a graffiti-covered brick wall — with a cut-out where the face should be. Hold it up, and you become the character.

Printed above the face, so it lands in every single photo taken with it: TAG US @MYEMILIOS.

Emilios pizza box tear-out photo prop showing TAG US @MYEMILIOS above the face cut-out
The tear-out prop in use. The tag prompt sits inside the frame, so it appears in every photo taken with it.

It is a small piece of design doing a lot of work. The customer is not being asked to post — they are being handed something fun that only makes sense if they photograph it. The tag prompt sits inside the frame rather than buried in a caption nobody reads. And because the prop survives the meal, it stays in the house after the pizza has gone.

The rest of the box works hard too

Vivid green, not white. Most pizza boxes are plain corrugated brown or white. A full-coverage green box with the Emilio's script logo in white is unmistakable on a doorstep, in a car, or on a table at a party. It reads as a brand rather than as packaging.

QR codes and app prompts on every side panel. Printed along the edges: "For delivery & collect order via [QR code] or download our app."

This is the part worth paying attention to if you run a takeaway. Every order placed through a third-party delivery platform costs you commission — frequently 25–30%. A QR code on the box puts your direct ordering channel in the customer's hand at the exact moment they are enjoying the food. Convert even a fraction of repeat orders from a platform to direct, and the packaging has paid for itself several times over.

Social handles printed on the box. "Follow us on" with Facebook and Instagram, so the box grows the audience as well as the order.

"Part of the community. Part of your life." Printed along the lid edge — a line that only works for a business that has genuinely been there thirty-five years, and lands with the people who have grown up with it.

Illustrated lid. The top of the box carries hand-drawn line art of Italian ingredients — basil, oregano, peppers, tomatoes, olive oil — in white on green, arranged around the logo. It gives a plain rectangle the feel of something considered rather than something ordered from a catalogue.

"Est. 1990" on the lid. A small line under the logo doing quiet work: thirty-five years of trading, stated as fact, on every box that leaves the shop.

A thank-you note printed inside the base. Open the box and there is a message printed on the board beneath the pizza — thanking the customer for choosing an independent, and explaining that everything is made fresh. Nobody sees it until the moment the lid comes up, which is the moment of most attention, and most boxes waste it on blank cardboard.

Emilios chef holding the branded pizza box tear-out photo prop Emilios staff member using the custom pizza box photo prop

The team trying the boxes on launch day.

Why most takeaways never do this

The barrier is almost never imagination. It is minimum order quantities.

Ask a traditional packaging supplier to print a custom design on pizza boxes and you will typically be quoted a minimum of a thousand units, often several thousand — per size. For a shop running pizzas alongside fish and chips and kebabs, that means committing thousands of pounds up front, across multiple formats, and finding somewhere dry to store it all.

For most independents the maths kills the idea before the design is even discussed. So they stay with plain boxes — not by choice, but by default.

We print digitally rather than using traditional printing plates. There is no expensive setup to spread across a huge run, which means no minimum order quantity. You can order a single pack. You can order several different products in one go. And because there is no plate cost, you can change the design on your next order at no extra charge — useful for seasonal runs, or for testing whether an idea like the tear-out prop actually works before committing to volume.

What we did

  • Design — full artwork, including the tear-out prop, the illustrated interior and the side panel layout
  • Print — full-colour digital printing across the complete box
  • Production — delivered flat, ready to fold in store

Thinking about something similar?

If you are running a takeaway and your packaging is currently doing nothing but holding food, there is more available to you than you might think — and you do not need to order thousands of units to find out.

Talk to us about what would work for your shop. We will design it, print it, and send you a digital proof to approve before anything goes to press.

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