Label rules › European Union

EU label requirements: Regulation 1169/2011, GPSR and the PPWR

Food sold anywhere in the European Union follows Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 on food information to consumers, in the official language(s) of each member state where it is sold. Other consumer products carry the identification of the General Product Safety Regulation (EU) 2023/988. The packaging itself falls under the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (EU) 2025/40, which applies from 12 August 2026.

Checked: 29 October 2026

Mandatory items

Food: Regulation 1169/2011

Article 9 lists the mandatory particulars: name, ingredients, the 14 allergens of Annex II emphasised in the list, quantity of characterising ingredients, net quantity, date, storage and use, the name and address of the food business operator in the EU, origin where required, alcohol strength above 1.2% and the nutrition declaration. Mandatory text has an x-height of at least 1.2 mm, or 0.9 mm when the largest surface is under 80 cm². The name, net quantity and alcohol strength sit in the same field of vision.

Each member state chooses the language(s): French in France, Spanish in Spain, German in Germany and Austria, and so on — a multilingual pack is fine as long as every market’s language is there.

Non-food: GPSR

Since 13 December 2024 every consumer product placed on the EU market shows its type and batch or serial number, the manufacturer’s name, postal address and electronic contact, and — for products made outside the EU — an economic operator established in the EU. Warnings and safety information are in the language of the country where it is sold. Cosmetics add the particulars of Regulation (EC) 1223/2009, including the responsible person and the PAO or minimum-durability date.

Packaging: the PPWR

The PPWR applies from 12 August 2026: recyclability, recycled content and minimisation duties come in stages. Harmonised material labels for sorting are due from August 2028 at the earliest, 24 months after the Commission’s implementing act, which was still being drafted in autumn 2026. Until then national sorting marks stay — France’s Triman and Info-tri, Italy’s environmental labelling with material codes, Spain’s rules under Royal Decree 1055/2022.

Why the rules look like this

EU labels answer crises and single-market needs at once:

1. 2011–2016 — Regulation 1169/2011 applies from December 2014 and the nutrition declaration from December 2016, replacing national rules so one pack can sell in 27 countries — in their languages.
2. 2013 — horse meat is found in products sold as beef across Europe. Traceability and origin labelling for meat are tightened; “origin” on an EU label is something inspectors test, not a design flourish.
3. 2017 — France launches Nutri-Score; Italy answers with its own NutrInform battery, and the EU fails to agree on one front-of-pack system. Front-of-pack scores stay national choices.
4. 2024–2026 — the Empowering Consumers Directive bans vague green claims from September 2026, the Commission signals in 2025 it will withdraw the broader Green Claims proposal, and the PPWR applies from August 2026. The greenest pack is now the one that says the least it cannot prove.

Seasons that sell packs

Christmas sells the most packaging across the EU — advent calendars, biscuit tins, panettone and stollen — and Easter follows. A pack sold in several countries for one season carries all their languages, so seasonal designs leave space for four or more versions of every mandatory line.

Who answers for the label

The food business operator under whose name the food is marketed, or the importer into the EU if that operator is outside it (Article 8 of Regulation 1169/2011); distributors must not supply food they know or presume to be non-compliant.

The designer and the printer are not named by these laws — but a contract can make them pay for the reprint. Keep the client’s written approval of the final copy; Drint’s review link records it.

If the label is wrong

Each member state sets its own penalties for breaking Regulation 1169/2011 — from administrative fines to criminal charges for fraud — and its inspectors can order products withdrawn or recalled. An undeclared allergen found in one country is notified through the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF), so the same pack may be pulled across the Union within days. For non-food goods, the GPSR adds Safety Gate alerts and market-surveillance powers, including the removal of online listings.

Who else loses, beyond the fine

A wrong label costs more than its fine, and the cost travels down the chain:

1. The shopper — an undeclared allergen can put someone in hospital; that is why recalls for allergens move fastest.
2. The brand — a recall notice with its name stays online for years, and retailers may delist the product.
3. The importer and distributor — stock held at the port or in a warehouse, storage fees, relabelling labour, sometimes a whole container sent back.
4. The shop — products immobilised or pulled from shelves in the middle of a season.
5. The printer — a reprint at its own cost if the contract says so, and a lost client either way.
6. The designer — the reprint blamed on the artwork, unless the client’s approval is on record.

Laying out one pack for several countries

A multilingual pack repeats every mandatory particular in each language, grouped by language (often marked with country codes such as FR · ES · IT), and keeps the name, net quantity and alcohol strength in one field of vision for each. The nutrition declaration is per 100 g or 100 ml, in the order energy, fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, protein, salt, as a table when space allows. The ℮ mark, when used, is at least 3 mm high and sits in the same field of vision as the net quantity.

Mistakes, and a check before printing

The usual problems: allergens not emphasised in the list; the percentage of an ingredient the name stresses (QUID) missing; nutrition per portion only; a business address outside the EU on food; “use by” on a food that only needs “best before”, or the other way round; vague green claims, which the Empowering Consumers Directive bans from 27 September 2026.

1. List the language of every country of sale and give each its full set of particulars.
2. Check the x-height: 1.2 mm, or 0.9 mm under 80 cm².
3. Emphasise the 14 allergens in the ingredients and add QUID where the name or pictures stress an ingredient.
4. Give nutrition per 100 g or 100 ml, and the operator’s EU address.
5. Keep each country’s sorting mark until the harmonised EU label applies.

Worked example: a 200 g box of butter cookies

Made in Vietnam and sold in Ireland (English), the pack reads, line by line (the client’s own names and numbers replace those in brackets):

1. Butter Biscuits
2. Ingredients: wheat flour, butter (milk) (18%), sugar, egg, salt, raising agent: sodium carbonates.
3. Net weight 200 g ℮
4. Best before end: see base · Lot: see base
5. Store in a cool, dry place.
6. [EU operator name], [address in the EU] · Origin: Vietnam
7. Nutrition declaration per 100 g: energy [ ] kJ / [ ] kcal · fat [ ] g, of which saturates [ ] g · carbohydrate [ ] g, of which sugars [ ] g · protein [ ] g · salt [ ] g

Why it reads this way

“Butter” is in the name, so its percentage (QUID) is given; allergens are in bold inside the list; “best before end” with month and year is enough for food that keeps over three months.

How Drint helps

Three kinds of people make packs for the European Union with Drint, and each needs something different:

Free, no account: the barcode generator, the mm to inches converter and the paper sizes table.

1. A business with its own brand — Drint has no label kit for the European Union yet, so the checklist on this page is your check before export. See the pack in 3D before it is printed, send the design to the person who must approve it with a review link, and hand the printer one CMYK PDF/X-4 with the die on its own layer, so nobody retypes the label.
2. A household business — start from a ready dieline cut to your exact box or bag size instead of paying for a die drawing, use your own photos on 3D mockups for your online shop, and keep the mandatory text exactly as you wrote it: Drint never translates or rewords a client’s copy.
3. A designer — lay out several markets from one design, each with its own language and items, keep every client’s approvals in one place, and show finished packs on a portfolio page at drint.io/your-name.

Laying it out in Drint

1. In the studio, click Insert → Product label and choose the market France / EU and the goods group.
2. Paste the client’s copy as they wrote it — Drint does not translate or reword it.
3. Check in Export lists the items still missing; export the CMYK PDF/X-4 with the die on its own layer for your printer.

Official sources

1. Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 — EUR-Lex
2. Regulation (EU) 2023/988 (GPSR) — EUR-Lex
3. Regulation (EU) 2025/40 (PPWR) — EUR-Lex
4. Regulation (EC) No 1223/2009 (cosmetics) — EUR-Lex

Drint checks this label while you design, for 47 countries: see how the label-law check works.

Lay out the label in Drint

Questions

A summary written to design packs, not legal advice. Check Regulation (EU) 1169/2011, Regulation (EU) 2023/988, Regulation (EU) 2025/40 on EUR-Lex and the national rules of each country of sale before printing.