PRINT LABELS THE MOST EFFICIENT WAY

Before Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti Oy got the CX/FX combo system, they weren’t able to offer good and reasonable prices for smaller amounts of multi-coloured labels. The CX/FX1200e system is a great addition to their existing label solution.

"With the CX1200e and FX1200e solution we are able to offer a wider range of labels."

The company Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti Oy was founded in 2007 by three entrepreneurs. Timo Rouvi is one of them and he’s responsible for sales and marketing. In the very beginning they had one client, one flexo press and a strong faith that they could create a good company from these starting points. And it worked. Now six people work hard at Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti to offer their clients different kind of labels with a short delivery time.

"As a label making company we are rather young – the youngest in Finland at the moment. We six, who are working here, have a total experience of over 120 years in label making, so we already know what we are doing here," says Timo proudly. "The key factors to our success are of course the professional skills as well as good machines. But the main factors are the good quality of labels and very flexible delivery times."

Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti doesn’t specialise to only a couple of industries. They are actually familiar with almost every branch of business; from food and non-food industries to logistics and retail. But they focus mainly on B2B clients (99% of their labels are delivered to B2B clients).

The main products are traditional labels but they also produce banderols printed on gummed paper. The printing house also has a few thermal transfer printers, which are mainly used for simple one-colour EAN code and information labels. As clients have also asked for machines to help with the labelling Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti now also owns different kind of light label dispensers and applicators, like the AP360e Label Applicator for round containers and the AP550e Flat-Surface Label Applicator by Primera Technology, Inc.

"The flexo press we have is in many cases ideal for our purposes but we also got requests of smaller amounts of multi-coloured labels and weren’t able to offer such labels at a reasonable price. Generally speaking the flexo press isn’t an ideal solution for smaller runs so something else had to be found to meet the various demands of the clients," explains Timo the reason why they were searching for a new printing machine in the first place.

Back in 2008, when Timo Rouvi looked for a system that could fill the production gap, he learned about Primera’s inkjet-based label printing systems. But the printing quality of those small desktop inkjet printers, which were available back then, wasn’t good enough for their requirements. Though the inkjet label printers weren’t meant for them, Timo kept in touch with Mr. Seppo Kuisma from Abraxco Oy, Primera’s local distributor. "One day Mr. Kuisma called me and told about a new system, which was on its way. The printing quality was a totally new level compared to inkjet systems," says Timo. One thing lead to another and in the end the CX1200e Color Label Press in combination with the FX1200e Digital Finishing System was installed in December 2011.

Of course there were a few other solutions Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti knew about, but the combination of printing quality and total investment for the combo solution was the main reason to purchase a CX1200e and FX1200e System. Before Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti got the CX/FX combo system, quotations for small-runs of labels weren’t really successful as they weren’t able to offer their clients a good and reasonable priced label solution. Therefore the biggest requirement was, without a doubt, to have a good printing quality for a reasonable price. An easy usage of the new solution was also one thing to consider.

"Now with the CX/FX solution we are able to offer a wider range of labels to our existing clients. This means they don’t have to look for another printing house for small-run jobs anymore," explains Timo the impact of the new solution to their business. They also acquired new clients; mostly small companies, which only need small numbers of labels.

The labels produced with the CX/ FX system are mainly multi-coloured labels but also blank labels for different purposes. The smallest numbers of those labels are generally speaking between 10 to 20 pieces and the biggest between 10,000 and 15,000 labels, always depending on the size of the label and the colour coverage. When producing labels and choosing the right equipment to do so, the number of usable substrates is important as well. For Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti that wasn’t an issue at all as they already had a good source to buy suitable material from. Almost all the materials they use come from the label manufacturer UPM Raflatac.

"After gaining experience with the CX1200e we have discovered that some of the normal flexo materials we have in stock are also suitable for this system. Mainly we use Raflatac’s ‘LaserGloss’ and ‘JetLaser’ label material. We also use common coat paper from Raflatac with different kind of adhesives (freeze, removable, etc.)," explains Timo. In order to not use plastic substrates and to lower the costs, the print house has replaced the use of polyester with paper and lamination, which works perfectly for most of their clients.

After printing labels with the CX1200e Color Label Press they are finished with the FX1200e Digital Finisher. Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti uses all functions the FX1200e offers including cutting and slitting as well as rewinding the labels. Most of the rolls are produced directly ready for delivery, only in some cases they have to be rewinded on a smaller core. Especially the lamination option is used quite a lot as the combination of a paper label material and a laminate is in most cases enough and a plastic label isn’t needed. The print house offers different kinds of transparent lamination foils, so a client can choose a suitable coating from a variety of foils.

Click on the pictures above to see the customer label signs!

To guarantee a smooth production, good service and support for label production equipment is essential.

"Our local partner, Abraxco, has been very helpful every time I contacted them," says Timo. In the beginning they experienced a few bumps in the road, mainly due to miscommunication and cultural differences between unalike countries and continents. "We got used to the flexo press procedure for years, so we had to change the way of thinking a few times." After solving these minor differences in thinking Pirkanmaan Laatuetiketti is happy with the choice they made.

They invested much less than they would have paid for other systems with similar features and after approximately two years the investment was amortised. Timo adds: "For us the price-quality ratio is good. We are a small company and this investment was of course a big one, but suitable. We have learned to compare the prices between the Primera system and our flexo press and can now offer the best solution depending on what the customer needs. We are definitely satisfied with the CX/FX combo."

Would he recommend the CX/FX printing and finishing system? "As a single machine this system isn’t perhaps the best way to start a business, but when you already have a certain infrastructure (e.g. materials, clients and industry knowledge) this machine combo is a very good alternative to increase existing business and create new interest." The biggest improvement certainly is that now they can offer smaller amounts of labels at a reasonable price and even with a delivery time of just several hours.

To summarise it all, Timo concludes: "Now we have a total combo of two printing systems we can use to print labels in the most efficient way."