Building a Printable Name Tag Labels Service with Stencil

If you've ever tried to build a name tag label feature inside your own app or service, you already know—it’s not a weekend project.

You’ll need a name tag template editor, a user-facing form or input UI, plus a backend service that generates printable PDFs. And that’s before you even start worrying about product polish, UX, or business operations like support and marketing.

That’s why many product teams and founders are choosing to leverage Stencil instead of building from scratch.

With Stencil, you get a powerful API, a drag‑and‑drop template editor, embeddable form support, and even live preview capabilities—all plug-and-play into your stack.

Let’s break down how you can build a flexible, scalable printable name tag labels service using Stencil.

Why Start from Zero? Use What’s Already Working

Building a “printable name tag” product seems simple—until you try to scale it.

Most apps need:

A design editor for creating label layouts
A data input layer (form or import flow)
A way to generate printable PDFs (with all data mapped to design)
A clean way to preview changes before print

Stencil provides these out-of-the-box:

A powerful Template Editor for designers
A no-code Form Builder for collecting inputs
A PDF/image generation API for devs
An Embeddable Live Preview that shows instant updates

Together, they make it easy to build a robust printable name tag feature into any modern web application.

Roles Split Smartly: Designers Design, Developers Build

One of Stencil’s biggest advantages is its separation of concerns.

Designers (or ops teams) can create templates using the visual editor—no code needed.
Developers can focus on API integration to generate images or PDFs, without touching the layout or design.
To list available templates using the API, and to generate images or PDFs, you can use Stencil’s API endpoint /v1/templates to fetch templates and /v1/images to render personalized images or PDFs. This keeps workflows modular and collaboration smooth.

This means less friction and faster handoffs. Everyone sticks to what they’re best at.

Option 1: Use Stencil’s Form Builder (The Fastest Path)

For simple use cases, Stencil’s Form Builder is often all you need.

You can:

Build your label template (logo, name, role, etc.)
Generate a custom form with fields mapped to the template
Share that form with users or embed it in your app
Automatically generate a printable image or PDF per entry

It’s drag-and-drop, no developer required. You can even embed the form in your internal admin portal, school app, or partner dashboard.

But what if you need more control?

Maybe you want to pull user names from a database to auto-fill the form. Or validate certain fields based on user roles. Or even let users pick a logo or badge icon from a pre-approved image library. In those cases, Form Builder may fall short. That’s when you’ll want to explore Option 2.

Option 2: Full API Access (Custom Forms + PDF Generation)

For teams with more advanced needs, Stencil’s API unlocks full flexibility.

You can:

Build your own custom form using framework like React, Vue, etc
Validate or preprocess data however you want
Call the Stencil API to generate PDFs or images on demand

Here’s a basic example of how to call the API:

SH
curl \-X POST https://api.usestencil.com/v1/pdfs \  
-H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \  
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \  
-d '{
  "template": "8c91201a-4c8a-4b39-8d79-540b36ff7267",
  "modifications": [
    {
      "name": "intro",
      "text": "my name is"
    },
    {
      "name": "name",
      "text": "John"
    }
  ]
}'

The response will include a downloadable link to the generated image or PDF.

Add Live Preview: Real-Time Feedback, Better UX

If you’re building your own form or app, you’ll want your users to see instant visual feedback as they update inputs.

That’s where Embeddable Live Preview comes in.

The image above shows how the users built a custom form that generates a product listing by searching through the database for the product information.

The live preview changes as user updates the selection.

Here’s how it works:

Embed the preview iframe into your form page and send updates to the iframe when form inputs change.

HTML
<iframe   
  id="template-preview"   
  src="https://app.usestencil.com/live-preview/TEMPLATE\_ID?token=YOUR\_TOKEN"   
  style="width:600px; height:600px; border:1px solid black;"\>  
</iframe\>

JAVASCRIPT
const preview = document.getElementById('template-preview');

function updatePreview(name, role) {  
  const message = {  
    namespace: 'stencil',  
    action: 'preview_changes',  
    data: [  
      { name: 'text_name', text: name },  
      { name: 'text_role', text: role }  
    ]
  };
  preview.contentWindow.postMessage(message, 'https://app.usestencil.com');  
}

This gives your users a live preview of the final name tag before hitting generate—cutting down on errors, back-and-forth, and frustration.

Using Embeddable Live Preview can also help reduce costs. Since users can see real-time updates, you avoid generating unnecessary images just to test changes—saving API usage and resources.

By combining both API and Embeddable Live Preview, you can build an immersive image or PDF generation right in your application.

Want to see a working demo? Check out this React sample project.

Building Your Own Printable Name Tag Product—Faster

Using Stencil, you can build a complete printable name tag labels product with:
- Custom templates
- Form input (your own or embedded)
- Live previews
- Printable PDF generation
- Role-based workflows (designers + devs)

This setup is perfect for:

School management tools
Event registration platforms
Visitor management SaaS
Conference badge apps
Internal tools for HR or admin teams

And all of this without reinventing the infrastructure behind design or print generation.

Final Thoughts: Don’t Rebuild What You Can Integrate

Building a printable name tag labels service doesn’t have to start from zero.

Stencil gives you everything you need to go from idea to working product:

No-code form builder
Custom template editor
Scalable API
Live preview embed

Whether you're a solo founder, product engineer, or building internal tools, you can plug Stencil into your workflow and move 10x faster.

Ready to build smarter?

Explore the API, try out the live preview, and start creating printable name tags in minutes—not months.