Most people who start a paint by numbers brand get the same three things wrong, in the same order: they order too much stock of a design nobody wanted, they underestimate what packaging adds to the unit cost, and they discover a legal problem with their artwork after the container has sailed. All three are avoidable, and none of them require a big budget to avoid.
This guide is written from the factory side of the table. We have produced launch orders for hundreds of small brands, and we have watched which ones reorder and which ones quietly stop. The pattern is remarkably consistent.
1. Choose artwork you can legally sell
Paint by numbers is a derivative product. The moment you convert a photograph or an illustration into a numbered pattern and sell it, you are reproducing someone's work — and the rules differ by market.
There are four safe sources of artwork:
- Your own images. Photographs you took, illustrations you drew. Keep the original files and the date they were created; a buyer or marketplace can ask.
- Commissioned work with a written assignment. A designer's invoice is not a licence. You need a document that transfers commercial reproduction rights, including the right to sublicense in product form.
- Licensed stock with the right scope. Many stock licences cover "print on demand" but not "mass-produced merchandise". Read the tier, and keep the receipt — some stock libraries will ask for the licence ID if a rights holder complains.
- Public domain and expired copyright. Classic paintings, vintage botanical plates, old maps. Check the specific scan, not just the painting: a museum's photograph of a public-domain work can carry its own restrictions in some jurisdictions.
The lookalike trap. Recreating a competitor's bestseller with small changes is the most common — and most expensive — mistake in this category. It produces a takedown on marketplaces, and platforms act on pattern similarity, not on whether you hired an artist. Ask your supplier to check your design against their existing catalogue before production. We do this by default for private label orders.
Also consider the paintability of the image, which is a separate question from legality. A busy photograph compresses into hundreds of slivers that no brush can fill cleanly. Our designers typically simplify a photo into 24 to 48 colour regions and re-weight the line work; if your design has a person's face, expect the pattern to look heavier than the original photograph until it is painted.
2. What belongs in the kit
A kit that ships with a canvas and seven paints will generate refunds. The minimum viable retail kit has six components, and each one is a place where cheap suppliers cut:
| Component | Cheap version | What to specify instead |
|---|---|---|
| Canvas | 200 gsm, glossy, rolled tight | 380–420 gsm cotton-blend, matte coating, folded |
| Paints | 2 ml, thin, dry after 6 months | 3 ml, thick pigment load, sealed, colour-matched |
| Brushes | 2 brushes, shedding | 3–5 synthetic brushes with tip-retention testing |
| Reference | Tiny colour thumbnail | A5 card, numbered key, finished artwork |
| Instructions | None | Illustrated 3-step leaflet in your market's language |
| Packaging | Plain poly bag | Printed carton with your brand and an EAN |
Two components get skipped most often and cause the most complaints: the reference card and the instruction leaflet. Both cost cents. Both are the difference between a four-star and a five-star review, because they are what a first-time painter reaches for when they get stuck at section 40.
Full component specifications are on our kit specification page, including sizes from 20×20 cm to 60×90 cm.
3. MOQ, tiers and the landed-cost maths
Supplier quotes are almost never comparable, because they are quoted at different quantities with different contents. Before you compare two prices, normalise them into a landed cost per sellable unit:
- Unit FOB price at your actual quantity, not the brochure quantity.
- Packaging uplift — the difference between a plain carton and your printed box, per unit.
- Insert uplift — reference card, thank-you card, leaflet.
- Freight per unit — sea freight divided by units, plus insurance.
- Duty and VAT/GST at your market's rate, on the customs value.
- Inland delivery from port to your warehouse or 3PL.
- Payment fees and FX spread — usually 1–3%.
A US$3.10 kit from one supplier and a US$3.45 kit from another can easily end up at US$3.28 and US$3.36 landed once freight weight and packaging are counted. Freight is weight-driven, so a lighter box and a folded canvas often beat a cheaper quote.
The other MOQ lever is how many designs. A 100-kit minimum per design means three designs costs you 300 units of stock. New brands routinely start with two designs at 100 each, keep the third as a pre-order, and use the first month of sales data to decide what to reorder — rather than committing 1,000 units to a guess.
Rule of thumb: your first order should be about two months of realistic sales, not your best-case forecast. Stock is cash, and the design you were most confident about is not always the one that sells.
4. Packaging: where the margin hides
A plain folding carton with your artwork costs very little more than a plain one at 500 units. A rigid gift box with magnetic closure and a foam insert can add more than the kit contents themselves. Neither is wrong — the question is what your price point can carry.
- Folding carton — the default for marketplaces, wholesale and subscription lines. Flat-packed, cheap to freight, MOQ 100.
- Rigid gift box — for gift positioning above roughly £25 or US$30 retail. Heavy: freight cost rises faster than you expect.
- Kraft mailer or printed sleeve — for dropshipping and market tests. Low cost, fast to produce, easy to change on a reorder.
Whatever you choose, order your packaging artwork at the same time as your canvas artwork. Suppliers who print boxes in-house (we do, see packaging options) can run both in one schedule; suppliers who outsource boxes will add one to two weeks to every packaging change.
5. Five questions to ask any supplier
- Do you own the factory or trade? Ask for a short video walkthrough showing the printing machine, the paint-filling line and the kitting area in one continuous shot. Trading companies cannot produce it.
- Who is my artwork contact? If the answer is "the sales manager will pass it on", expect three-day turnaround on design changes. You want to talk to the designer.
- What is your breakage and rejection rate? A supplier who says "zero" is not measuring. Anything under 1% for canvas in export cartons is credible.
- Which test reports can you provide, and for which market? EN71-3 for the EU and UK, ASTM D-4236 for the US. Ask to see the report before you pay a deposit, and confirm it covers the paints you are buying.
- What happens if the goods arrive wrong? Get the remedy in writing: reprint, credit, or a fix in the next run — and the window in which you can claim.
6. A realistic 10-week launch timeline
| Week | What happens | Who |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Artwork selection, rights check, brief to supplier | You |
| 1–2 | Free digital mockups, colour count decisions, quotation | Supplier |
| 2–3 | Physical sample produced and shipped by express | Supplier |
| 3–4 | Sample approval, packaging artwork finalised, deposit paid | You |
| 4–6 | Bulk production (8–15 days), photo inspection report | Supplier |
| 6–7 | Balance payment, booking, sea or air freight departure | Both |
| 7–9 | Transit; product photography and listings prepared in parallel | You |
| 9–10 | Arrival, customs clearance, stock into 3PL, launch | You |
Ten weeks assumes sea freight and no artwork surprises. If you need to launch in four weeks, plan on express or air freight from the start and expect to pay for it — or start with a smaller air-shipped batch of one design and build the rest by sea.
If you would rather not hold stock at all for the first month, our dropship programme ships single kits with no minimum order, which is a legitimate way to test demand before you commit to a container.
Where to go next
- Our wholesale terms and price tiers, published openly.
- Every component and size on the kit specification page.
- Private label vs white label vs OEM — what you are actually buying.
- Ready to price your own design? Send artwork for a free mockup — the reply usually includes a quote.
Get a free mockup of your first design
Send a photo or an idea plus your quantity. Within 24 hours you will have a canvas preview, a box mockup and an itemised FOB Dalian price.