Swiss gourmet food manufacturer “Metzgerei Ziegler” demands a great deal of its in-house label production solution and the involved LX2000e Color Label Printer
For over a century family-owned butcher shop “Metzgerei Ziegler” is dedicating itself to the production of homemade, meat-based delicacies. Since 1899 the expanding business strives to offer their customers the best selection made from the finest ingredients. Until today it is the number one address for fine foods in the area of Zurich with around 50 employees. Only the best regional meat is chosen and processed in their own factory in Oberglatt, operating with the highest hygiene standards and the latest cooling systems.
Not only the commitment to quality is an important part of the gourmet foods’ creation process but also the fast and efficient product labelling. In order to stay flexible and print their own food labels for their charcuterie products and sauces (front and lid labels) Metzgerei Ziegler was looking for a suitable printing solution. Selfix AG, a traditional label printing company from Otelfingen, supported the company in its selection process and delivers the food labels according to the company’s specifications and high quality standards.
Metzgerei Ziegler decided on Primera’s LX2000e Color Label Printer to be used for the label production. It prints with pigmented ink and offers an impressive resolution of 4800 pixels along with a print width of 203.2 mm and a print speed of 152.4 mm/s. Further benefits are the intergrated LAN connection and label unwinder as well as the built-in cutter. To produce the many varieties of labels with different expiration dates the butchery uses NiceLabel PowerForms. The provided and easy to use label design program helps creating even the most complex labels including the calculation of the expiry date. Additionally, the user interface allows the fast creation of intuitive label print interfaces with a label preview. That makes it easy, even for untrained staff, to manage and print several hundreds or thousands of different label layouts without great efforts or additional training. This makes it very convenient, especially in busy times.
Labelling refrigerated food inevitably leads to condensation on the label. Therefore only water-resistant PP inkjet labels can be used. For this purpose Selfix selected a 90 μ white inkjet PP foil with a food safe acrylic coating with a reliable initial and end adhesion on damp and cooled surfaces. Metzgerei Ziegler uses the LX2000e Color Label Printer due to its pigment ink. Compared to dye ink the pigment ink protects the printout against external influences like abrasion or moisture. This ensures that the labels keep shining and neither fade, smudge or smear throughout the entire product life cycle.
Printing on round and non-rectangular labels as well as rotated fonts are the challenges, which Swiss label printing company, Selfix AG, and Primera’s LX2000e had to overcome.
The printing on round and non-rectangular labels was a challenge, which has to be mastered by Selfix. Primera’s LX2000e has an adjustable label sensor working in the range of 0 and 3 inches (0 and 76.2 mm). To ensure an accurate printing when switching from round sauce labels to banana-shaped front labels the sensor would need to be adjusted every time. That would inevitably cause delays and wasted labels. This can be avoided by using black marks on the back of each label. For Metzgerei Ziegler Selfix printed two black marks to change the outline of each label (round, banana-shaped) into a virtual rectangle that enables the printer’s sensor to scan and recognise the labels without adjustment. This significantly saves time and money.
A minor challenge was the printing of angled fonts on conical containers. If a text is printed with an angle of 0º, the text would appear to be angled or oblique. Thank to NiceLabel fonts and graphics can be rotated in 1º steps (+/-), which makes it possible to fit them in the desired angle. As NiceLabel also allows graphics for serial printing the text graphics could be integrated via database. Last but not least a QR code with a link to www.zieglermetzg.ch has been added to provide menu suggestions and coOKIng instructions.
"A very good solution that works excellently," says logistics manager Roland Wagner praising the solution’s high quality and the know-how of Selfix. "We wouldn’t be able to achieve this result without their expertise."
Mr Jürg Baumgartner, the owner, is stoked, "Our sauce front label can be printed as flexible, versatile and precise as possible, meaning the text appears straight on the label. Our customers appreciate our homemade specialities and are delighted about the beautifully designed and packed products."