Existing mould or new tooling?
One thing to clear up first, because it changes how you read the rest of this: Masaş does not keep finished printed tins in stock. What we hold are 141 moulds — 7 shape families of tooling built up since 1979 — and every printed order is produced to order on one of them. (The one exception is plain, unprinted tins, which we do sell from existing moulds in small quantities.) So the real question at the start of a project is not “what do you have in stock”, it is “does my tin run on a mould you already have, or does it need a new one”. A tin on an existing mould carries no tooling cost and ships in 4–6 weeks. A new mould adds roughly 8 weeks the first time, cut in our own studio, and nothing on repeat orders. Below is the comparison, including the part most suppliers leave vague: who owns the mould afterwards.
- Moulds we hold
- 141
- Shape families
- 7
- On an existing mould
- 4–6 weeks
- New mould, first run
- +8 weeks
| What you are comparing | Existing mould | New mould |
|---|---|---|
| Tooling cost | None. The mould exists and has been paid for long ago. | A one-time tooling charge, quoted per project against the drawing. Nothing on any repeat order afterwards. |
| First delivery | 4–6 weeks from approved artwork. | Roughly eight weeks for the tooling, then the same 4–6 weeks of production. |
| Repeat orders | 4–6 weeks. Same mould, new artwork if you want it. | 4–6 weeks, exactly like an existing mould — because by then it is one. |
| Sample before you commit | We send a real tin from production, free; you cover the courier. You can hold the thing before you order it. | Not possible before the mould exists. You are approving a drawing, and the first physical sample is the first run. |
| What you can have | One of the moulds we already hold. A size within a few millimetres of your target usually exists. | Exactly the shape and size you draw, including silhouettes nothing else in the range covers. |
| Risk | Known. The mould has run thousands of times and we know how it behaves with different plate gauges. | Development risk is real. Tolerances and the draw settle over the first run, and a deep or complex form takes more settling than a shallow one. |
| Who owns the mould | Masaş. It stays in our tooling studio in İstanbul. | Masaş, even after the tooling charge is paid. It stays in our studio and it does not move to another manufacturer. |
| Is the shape yours alone | No. Other customers use the same moulds with their own artwork. | No. The form may be produced for other customers later. What is exclusive to you is your design and your printing, not the shape. |
| Minimum order | 5,000–25,000 pieces per design, depending on size. | The same. New tooling does not raise the minimum. |
Who owns the mould — the plain answer
The mould belongs to Masaş. It stays in our tooling studio in İstanbul, we store and maintain it, and it does not move to another manufacturer. Paying the tooling charge pays for the mould to be made and for your tin to exist; it does not buy the mould itself and it does not buy exclusive rights to the shape. The form may be produced for another customer at some point in the future. What is exclusive to you is your artwork, your colours and your printing — and in practice that is what customers recognise on a shelf, not the geometry underneath it.
We would rather state that plainly than let you assume otherwise and find out later. It is also the answer we would want you to demand from anyone else: ask every supplier, in writing, who owns the tooling once it is paid for, where it is physically stored, and whether it can be released or moved. Suppliers differ on this and the difference matters, so it belongs in the quotation rather than in a conversation someone remembers differently a year later. If shape exclusivity genuinely matters to your brand, raise it explicitly before you order — it is a commercial term to be agreed in writing, never something to assume.
When a new mould is worth it
When the silhouette is doing the selling — a heart, a book, a shaped seasonal line — and the outline is what the buyer remembers before they read the artwork. When you have a genuine dimensional constraint: a filled pouch, an insert, a bottle or a set that has to sit inside without forcing. When the programme repeats for years, so the one-time charge spreads over several seasons and every reorder afterwards costs nothing extra in tooling. And when the difference is strategic rather than cosmetic — a format your competitors cannot simply order next month.
When it is not
For a one-off promotion, a first launch, or a test of an idea that has not proved itself yet, a new mould is usually the wrong place to spend the money. Eight weeks and a tooling charge buy you a shape; the same money spent on better artwork and a stronger finish on a mould we already have buys you a pack that reaches the shelf two months sooner. Send us the dimensions and the fill weight you had in mind before you commission anything — in most cases we can point at a mould already in the studio that is within a few millimetres of it, and the answer costs you nothing.
Questions buyers ask
Do you keep tins in stock?
No. We hold moulds, not finished goods. Every tin is produced to order — offset printed with your artwork, formed and lacquered for your run — so there is no shelf of blank tins to draw from. When our pages refer to a size as being available without tooling, it means we already hold the mould for it, not that the tin is sitting in a warehouse. That is why the minimum order exists at all: nothing is made until you order it.
If I pay for the tooling, do I own the mould?
No. The mould belongs to Masaş, stays in our studio in İstanbul, and does not move to another manufacturer. The tooling charge covers making it and getting your tin produced, not ownership of the tool or exclusive rights to the shape. Your artwork and printing are yours. We say this openly because the alternative is you assuming otherwise; ask every supplier the same question in writing, because they do not all answer it the same way.
Can another company order the same shape as mine?
For the shape, yes — the form may be produced for other customers, and the same is true of every mould in our range. For your pack, no: the design, the colours, the embossing and the print are yours and are not offered to anyone else. If exclusivity of the form itself is important to your brand, say so before you order rather than after, so it can be discussed as a written commercial term rather than assumed.
How long does a new mould take?
Roughly eight weeks, cut in our own studio in İstanbul rather than subcontracted, and then production runs on the normal 4–6 week schedule. On every order after the first, the mould already exists, so you are back to 4–6 weeks with no tooling element at all. If your deadline cannot absorb the first eight weeks, tell us the date and the dimensions — an existing mould that is close enough is often the difference between making the season and missing it.