Flexo Printer Through and Through
It wasn’t so long ago that flexography was thought of as delivering a second-rate product when compared to offset and gravure. Since the day it opened its doors 36 years ago, Ontario-based Labelad has refused to accept that assumption, proving to its customers time and time again that it can deliver a high-quality flexographic product.
A full packaging solution provider with 85 employees, Labelad’s extensive product line includes pressure-sensitive and shrink-sleeve labels, mono- to multi-layer short-run flexible packaging, smart labels containing RFID and Near Field Communication products, and solutions for the beauty and health markets.
Labelad has 10 presses, including Mark Andy and Gallus narrow-web lines, as well as an HP Indigo 4000—now a WS4050—it installed in 2004. A longtime user of Esko technology, the company uses a Backstage server and a suite of Esko software: PackEdge for preproduction, Plato for layout, and Esko color management—along with a CDI digital imager with HD Flexo technology for platemaking. The company is a certified HD Flexo user—the first in Canada—a designation given by Esko that demonstrates a high level of expertise in running the technology.
Technological advances over the last 10 years may have given Labelad better tools to compete against offset and gravure, but, notes Ken Norris, manager, graphics and digital solutions, the company has “never shied away from difficult designs in the past; we worked with our clients to deliver to them a product that met their expectations with color corrections and within our print tolerances.”
Being the best
Its customer-first philosophy led to the 2010 launch of its ETDBW (Easy To Do Business With) program. The goal is simply to be a “Best in Class” service provider.
“Our mission is to be the easiest company to do business with in the packaging industry,” says Joe Campbell, vice president and general manager. “Too many companies add unnecessary complexities to their business by focusing on internal priorities and processes while ignoring what is really important to the customer. At Labelad, the priority is to provide the best customer experience and to differentiate ourselves through service. We design the supply programs to assist our customers to achieve their goals. It’s simple...to help your customer grow has to be the driving priority. It’s about making your customer say ‘Wow! No other packaging company does what you do!’”
Equally important to Labelad is what it refers to as Brand Guardianship. While many of its competitors think of themselves as printers or convertors, Labelad considers itself “guardians of the brands that our customers entrust to us,” says Campbell. “The words ‘close enough’ are never spoken in our facility, we manage our customers’ brands as if they were our brands. Our graphics, printing, and quality departments proudly and fiercely manage all aspects of production, from file creation to strict color management, to ensure our customers reach their brand potential through packaging.”
An early adopter of digital platemaking, Labelad bought its first Esko CDI platesetter in 2001. “We stopped using film to make plates later that year,” explains Norris. “It was day and night how much digital platemaking increased our quality of printing over analog platemaking.”
In 2005, Labelad upgraded to the larger and faster Esko CDI Spark 4835 digital imager and in 2011, it upgraded once again, to Esko’s HD Flexo technology, which uses special screening technology and a higher imaging resolution.
For Labelad, the decision to implement digital platemaking, and then HD Flexo, had everything to do with ramping up the quality level. The move into digital platemaking in 2001 also allowed Labelad to compete on more equal footing with offset.
Stealing business from offset
“We’ve been stealing business from offset for 10 years now, offering the high-end quality required by the health and beauty and food industries,” says Norris. “When you’re dealing with food packaging, the product has to pop off the label or the package. The combination of digital platemaking with Esko’s dot technology and flexo inks made the difference.”
Labelad’s quest to always stay several steps ahead of the competition led it to HD Flexo. “We have always thought of ourselves as a quality printer and with the way technology has grown and been adopted, we found that other companies were catching up to us,” says Norris. “We are always looking for ways to increase the quality of our printing and platemaking and were looking for that difference maker. Quality is the first thing I look for; productivity is key but there are always ways to improve productivity.
“With HD Flexo we deliver print that is better than gravure and offset quality—that’s not just our opinion, but our customers’ also,” he adds. “If you take the time to do proper color work, combined with the advancements of technology out there, any design is possible. With HD Flexo, fade-offs are not an issue anymore and the amount of detail you can hold on the plate with the increased linescreen is fabulous. We have been receiving great feedback from our clients and their designers on the quality, sharpness of our print, the fades and the amount of detail we can hold.”
What hasn’t changed for Labelad is the time it spends on creating color separations. There is no such thing as a minimum dot in its toolkit. To keep plate production up to speed with the presses, Labelad has counterbalanced the time it spends on color separations by running every job at 4,000 dpi.
“All of our clients deserve the best quality we can give them and it helps with the workflow on the platesetter,” says Norris. “By doing everything at 4,000 dpi, we can gang up any job on a sheet to cut down on waste and not wait to fill up a plate—eliminating the bottleneck that was happening.”
Founding principles
Labelad was founded on the principle of offering ‘innovative solutions to its customers.’ The company continually strives to raise the quality bar of the flexographic packaging industry, not only using the most advanced technologies to ensure the highest quality product but also developing solutions to meet customers’ evolving needs.
The brand management support Labelad provides ensures that brand consistency is met no matter what choices its customers make to design and market their products—not an easy task, considering the variety of containers, decorations, and colors now available.
“In the early package design stage of a shampoo product, for example, our customers have choices to package the shampoo in a rigid plastic bottle, a decorated tube, a stand-up pouch, and maybe a marketing mailer sachet,” explains Campbell. “Decoration choices may include a pressure sensitive label, a shrink sleeve label, roll fed label, reverse or surface printed films, or a paper product. The color of the product packaged and the desired opacity (clear or colored) of the container or graphics design also need to be considered.”
Labelad encourages its customers to allow its production staff to ‘listen in’ and be a part of the early package design conversations to help develop a tactical brand management print strategy that ensures the brand communicates to the market exactly what the customer intends.
“Our customers compete at the retail level, which is the most competitive environment in the world,” says Campbell. “They need us to constantly present ideas and options, whether it be a further-out innovation like RFID chips embedded in labels or flexible packaging structures, to immediate sustainable logistic packaging solutions to reduce the number of trucks on the road.”
Along with developments in smart labels using RFID, innovations include engineering a two-door hinge that has incredible open/close properties with eye-catching access tabs for a customer who required more real estate on its current labels, to new continuous print (plate gap free) flexible packaging and pressure sensitive labels run with vegetable-based inks.
Going forward, Labelad is looking to widen its product offering in pressure sensitive and flexible packaging products. “We will continue on our journey to HACCP compliance and the integration of RFID technology into our core product lines,” says Campbell. “We are looking at expanded color gamut, as well as G7. We feel there can be real benefits that can be had for us and our clients with these two processes.” pP