Your game’s insert is one of its most important parts. A well-designed insert holds your game’s components in place, prevents pieces from going missing, and prevents damage to pieces that can occur during shipping and storage.
The two most common game insert materials are plastic and cardboard. Each material has its own advantages and disadvantages, and the right choice depends on your game’s needs, the quantity in which you intend to manufacture and your target audience.
Below, we’ve compared plastic and cardboard inserts so you can make the right decisions for your game.
Plastic Board Game Inserts
Plastic inserts are commonly used in mass-market board games. They’re unusually produced through injection molding, a process where heated plastic is poured into a mold and formed to create an insert that fits your game’s components.
With injection molding, once a mold is created, thousands of identical inserts can be produced quickly and efficiently at a low cost.
Because plastic inserts can be produced affordably at scale, they’re a popular option for mass market games produced in large quantities. The larger manufacturing run size means the cost of creating the mold can be spread over many units, resulting in low per-unit pricing.
Plastic game inserts offer several advantages:
- Durability. Plastic is strong, flexible and resistant to wear. It can also tolerate getting wet from spilled drinks without deteriorating. This can make it a good choice for kids’ games, drinking games, or other games that are used heavily.
- Lightweight. Plastic is stronger than cardboard relative to its weight, meaning plastic inserts can save weight while still protecting a game’s components. This can result in lower shipping costs.
- Complex shapes are possible. Because plastic inserts are injection molded, they can be made in more complex shapes than cardboard inserts. This is good if your game has complex pieces or intricate miniatures.
- Affordable for mass manufacturing. Plastic inserts have a low per-unit cost when they are manufactured in bulk, making them a good choice for mass market games.
Plastic inserts also have several disadvantages:
- High upfront costs. Because plastic inserts need a mold, they’re only cost effective for large production runs. If your game is made in a small quantity, the cost of preparing the mold can make plastic inserts too expensive.
- Less flexible to design changes. Once you’ve made the molds for your plastic inserts, making changes can be costly. This makes it essential to finalize your component design before you design molds for your plastic inserts.
- Environmentally unfriendly. Compared to cardboard and other materials, plastic isn’t the most environmentally friendly. If you’re an environmentally conscious publisher, you may want to consider an alternative material for your inserts.
Cardboard Game Inserts
Cardboard inserts are made by cutting sheets of regular or corrugated cardboard into dividers, trays and compartments to fit game components. These inserts are more common in indie and mid-tier games that are manufactured in smaller quantities.
Our guide to regular vs. corrugated cardboard for game inserts goes into more detail about the different types of cardboard used for insert manufacturing.
Unlike plastic inserts, which require mold creation, cardboard inserts are quick and inexpensive to produce, with lower setup costs and shorter lead times.
The biggest advantages of cardboard inserts include:
- Lower costs for low-volume manufacturing. Cardboard inserts don’t require molds to be fabricated. This reduces setup costs and makes them suitable for smaller print runs.
- Eco-friendly. Compared to plastic inserts, cardboard is more eco-friendly. Inserts made from cardboard are more easily recyclable and can be made from sustainable materials, making them great if you want to create an environmentally-friendly game.
- Lightweight. Although the weight of cardboard can vary, some types of cardboard have a low weight, meaning they’re unlikely to make your game overly heavy.
- More customizable. The smooth surfaces of cardboard can be printed on or finished to match your game’s theme, which typically isn’t possible with plastic.
Like all materials, cardboard also has some disadvantages when used for inserts:
- Lower durability. Over time, cardboard inserts can bend and wear, especially if your game has heavy or sharp components. Cardboard also deteriorates quickly when it’s exposed to water, resulting in soggy game components.
- Limited strength for heavy pieces. If your game has heavy miniatures, metal coins or other heavy components, thin cardboard may warp when it’s used for the insert.
- Less protection during shipping. Some forms of cardboard aren’t strong enough for optimal protection when shipping your game, although corrugated cardboard can offer some additional durability.
Which is Best for Your Game?
The best choice between plastic and cardboard inserts depends on your game’s components, your planned manufacturing quantity, and other factors.
If you’re producing your game in a small quantity, such as less than 10,000 units, cardboard is likely to be more cost-effective than plastic. This is because cardboard inserts can be created without any need to design and manufacture custom molds.
For larger quantities, plastic becomes a more cost-effective option, with the financial benefits of plastic increasing as your production run grows larger.
When it comes to strength and durability, cardboard is fine for smaller games with light pieces, such as card games or light board games. However, plastic may be worth considering if you’re making a game with heavy miniatures, metal pieces, or other weighty components.
Finally, if you’re aiming for sustainability and eco-friendliness, you’ll likely want to choose a type of cardboard that’s recyclable and made with minimal environmental damage. You can find out more about this on our eco-friendly game manufacturing page.
Plastic vs. Cardboard for Inserts: The Bottom Line
Like with all materials used in board game manufacturing, there’s no “best” when it comes to the material you choose for your game’s insert. Instead, choosing between plastic and cardboard is all about weighing the trade-offs and making the right decision based on your game’s needs.
Plastic and cardboard both bring clear advantages to the table. If you need help choosing which material is the right choice for your game’s inserts, or if you’d like assistance with any aspect of manufacturing your game, feel free to contact us.
Our team can help you select materials, get your artwork ready for production, and make your game to the highest standards while achieving the best value for your money.
