Peace of Mind Organizing

I'm swooning over the new Brother P-touch Cube

17 August 2017

Professional organizers love our label makers. I’ve owned a few Brother P-touch label makers over the last dozen years an have always appreciated the clean, crisp laminated labels and the QWERTY keyboards. (I blogged about how to select a label maker back in 2015).

None of my label makers has been perfect. The LED readout on my PT-2030 isn’t backlit and sometimes it’s hard to read. The keyboard is too small to touch type, so typing can be laborious. Navigating the little readout to make corrections is tedious. But it still makes great labels.

I’m delighted to report that Brother has upped its label maker game and created the Brother PT-P300BT aka the Brother P-touch Cube and it’s a game changer. The Cube is a bluetooth-enabled label printer that links with a smartphone app. You download the P-touch Design&Print app and use it to type and design your labels. (The app is available for Apple and Android phones.) Your phone communicates with the printer wirelessly via bluetooth. And it works like a charm.

I just finished up a large team organizing project that required my making a lot of labels. I had read about the Cube on an online forum for professional organizers and was intrigued. But I didn’t see an immediate need to shell out $60 for a new label maker. After labeling 20 or more bins on this job, I realized that if I could dictate my labels rather than type them, the process would go faster. I had a day between the third and fourth sessions of this job, so I purchased the Cube (which was on sale for $45). Yesterday I created 20 or so labels at the end of the session and it was so fast and easy. I’m in love with this new technology.

Here are a few of the features packed into the Cube and the Design&Print app:

• It’s smaller than a traditional label maker (though at 4.6” x 4.6” x 2.5” it’s by no means tiny).
• It uses regular TZ laminated tape cartridges, so I don’t have to buy new label tape.
• There’s lots of flexibility in terms of designing the labels; the app has many frames and symbols.
• The app comes with templates for attractive labels for typical uses (cords, flash drives, clothing bins, kitchen, for example).
• You can use any font that your phone has available.
• My team members can put the app on their phones and print to my printer (using my tape) from wherever we are in the client’s house.
• You dictate your labels like you dictate your texts!

Is it perfect? Of course not. Here’s my wish list to make it better:

• I wish it had a rechargeable battery (like my phone) rather than my having to use the included power adapter or my own batteries (it takes 6 AAA batteries, not included).
• I wish it had an automatic label cutter. Instead I have to press down on the cutter between labels.
• I wish I didn’t have to pair my phone to the device each time I use it. In fairness, I’ve had it for less than 48 hours—maybe there’s a fix for that.
• I wish it would default to one label to be printed so I didn’t have to touch the quantity each time. (Again, perhaps there’s a setting for that I haven’t found.)

The Cube is on sale for $45 at all the online outlets I checked (Office Depot, Amazon, Staples). I believe that sale price expires on August 19. That said, I would have been happy to pay the full price of $60. For me, it’s well worth the price tag.

Tagged with: labels, organizing products

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