Materials and what they imply
- PET / PETG — clear, lightweight, inexpensive. PETG gives better clarity and chemical resistance; PET is cheaper and more brittle.
- PP / PE — opaque, excellent chemical resistance, the default for airless and tube formats.
- Acrylic (PMMA) — the heavy, thick-wall premium look. Scratches, and cracks under impact in cold weather.
- Glass — inert and premium; frosted and coated versions dominate skincare. Freight breakage and tooling cost are the trade-offs.
- PCR — recycled content, increasingly requested by EU buyers. Ask for the percentage and the certification, not just the claim.
Closures decide whether the product works
An airless pump, a lotion pump, a mist sprayer and a dropper are different engineering problems. Airless pumps need a matched dose per stroke and a piston that travels cleanly; a 15 ml airless at 0.2 ml per stroke behaves nothing like a 50 ml at 0.5 ml. Droppers need a teat that does not harden in contact with the formula. Mist sprayers are intolerant of high viscosity — the most common cause of a 'broken' spray is a formula that was never tested through the actual actuator.
Decoration, MOQ and tooling
Silk screen and hot stamp are the cheap, reliable options. Frosting, soft-touch coating and UV metallisation look expensive and are the first things to scuff in transit — specify a rub test. Stock moulds usually start at 1,000–3,000 pieces with decoration; a custom mould runs 5,000–10,000 with tooling at USD 1,000–5,000 and 30–45 days. Stock shapes ship in 15–25 days.
Test the pack with your formula, not with water
Fill a sample with the actual formula and run a 45 °C / four-week stability test before committing to a production run. Check for weight loss through the closure, distortion of the shoulder, colour migration into the wall, and pump priming after the pack has sat on its side. A pack that passes with water and fails with a silicone-heavy serum is not unusual — it is the norm.