Designing a Business Envelope

CGR 115

Business Envelopes have a lot of regulations for designers as to what space they can use in their design on the front of the business envelope. To the bottom is a diagram that shows the areas that a designer can and cannot design on.

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Because all mail must go through the US mail system, there are very strict regulations on what parts you can and cannot design on. This shows that on the front of the envelope, there are only two areas that you can work on, the left bottom corner, and the middle of the top of the envelope.

The top left is needed for return address, top right for stamp, and most of the middle is for mailing address, and bottom right for the bar code. The back of the envelope though, you can design on the entire back, there are no restrictions when it comes to the back of the envelope.

The backs of the envelope may be different, it can be the triangle on the back, or the more square shape flap, both can be designed on and bring your brand back to your envelope. The typical size for this business envelope is 4 1/8 x 9 1/2. This is the size I am working with, and my main goal is to bring my brand back and to incorporate it into the front and back of the envelope. There are also envelopes with windows in the front, which is another option to design on, which you are also allowed to have a solid color for the base envelope, but it doesn't usually look very nice especially if its too dark because the bar code has to be able to be seen.

There are always a lot of options for designing on the envelope, as long as you keep all the legal parts in mind and design around the restrictions.