I needed to print some mailing labels, and purchased Avery 8160 mailing labels for that purpose. These are 1" x 2 & 5/8" labels, 30 to a sheet. I wanted to use InDesign for the mailing labels, and did a quick internet search for a template. Avery had one, which I tried to download, but what downloaded was a file called "OffercastInstaller_AVR_U-0087-01-P_.exe". No way am I going to run an EXE just to get a mailing label template, and absolutely no way if it is has "OffercastInstaller" in the name.
So I whipped up my own Avery 8160 template for Adobe InDesign, one that I'm pretty sure is a lot better than what Avery was providing.
So I whipped up my own Avery 8160 template for Adobe InDesign, one that I'm pretty sure is a lot better than what Avery was providing.
A native InDesign "indt" template (created in CS3) is available for download:
| Avery_8160_Template_For_Adobe_InDesign.indt |
Or you can download a zip of the template:
| Avery_8160_Template_For_Adobe_InDesign.zip |
How to Use the Template
In InDesign, simply use the File > Open command to open the template file, and it will open as a new InDesign document. The document will have four layers. I describe each one below.
Guides Only
This layer contains only the horizontal guides that divide the sheet into 10 even sections. If you hide the other layers, you can use this layer as a guide for placement of your own text elements or objects.
Individual Text Boxes without Text
This layer has an individual (non-linked) text frame in the right spot for each of the 30 labels. The text frames are invisible until you click on them (i.e. no borders or fill), have a small margin designated, and are set to center text vertically.
Individual Text Boxes with Dummy Text
This layer has individual (non-linked) text frames in the right spot for each of the 30 labels. The text frames all have a dummy 3 line address in them, with no borders or fill.
Linked Text Boxes with Dummy Text
This is the layer that I think you should use. It has 30 linked text frames in the right spot for each of the 30 labels, with dummy text. To put your own addresses (or other text) into the text frames, simply follow this procedure:
Guides Only
This layer contains only the horizontal guides that divide the sheet into 10 even sections. If you hide the other layers, you can use this layer as a guide for placement of your own text elements or objects.
Individual Text Boxes without Text
This layer has an individual (non-linked) text frame in the right spot for each of the 30 labels. The text frames are invisible until you click on them (i.e. no borders or fill), have a small margin designated, and are set to center text vertically.
Individual Text Boxes with Dummy Text
This layer has individual (non-linked) text frames in the right spot for each of the 30 labels. The text frames all have a dummy 3 line address in them, with no borders or fill.
Linked Text Boxes with Dummy Text
This is the layer that I think you should use. It has 30 linked text frames in the right spot for each of the 30 labels, with dummy text. To put your own addresses (or other text) into the text frames, simply follow this procedure:
- Open Notepad or another text editor.
- Input the text for all your labels. If you have three-row labels, leave an empty line between the text for each label. If you have four-row labels, don't leave a space between the text for each label.
- Copy the entire list of label text to your clipboard.
- In the InDesign template, using the text tool, click in the top left label and select all (CTRL+A).
- Paste the contents of your clipboard (CTRL+V), replacing the dummy text.
- Each label should have an address (or whatever your text was) in it. You may need to make adjustments to leading and/or line spacing to make your label text flow properly across the labels.
Concluding Comments
This is a sort of "quick and dirty" template solution. There may be better templates out there, or better ways to structure a template (feel free to comment if you think so). Also, InDesign CS3 (the antiquated version I am still using) supports "mail merge" using XML data. I've never used the merge feature, but it seems like too much work for what I needed, to structure my data as XML, and put the appropriate tags in my document. Probably if I was doing mailing labels more regularly, it would make sense to go the XML merge route.
RSS Feed