The label printing industry is still evolving rapidly. Delivery times get shorter, and brand owners want to distinguish themselves from their competitors with specific and unique products. Therefore, job sizes are smaller and short change-over times become increasingly important.
Because of this, scheduling printing jobs becomes a real challenge for production leaders. You can only plan a few days ahead, and changing schedules at the last minute becomes common practice
For this reason, innovation gets more and more important to retain high-quality output at the lowest cost per 1000 labels. Printing techniques are a key area of innovation. In this blog, I’ll tell you more about the way digital label printing and hybrid printing help you to reduce set-up time and ensure short delivery times.
Digital label printing
A shift to digital label printing is a good solution to keep up with the market. It’s a cost-effective method to produce custom labels with high-quality graphics and vibrant colours. Digital printing is the ideal printing technique for short to medium label jobs. Since there are no costs for printing plates and set-ups, price breaks for digital label printers come at much lower quantities than conventional presses.
No printing plates means you can realise all customer requirements because there are little to no limitations to what you can do. All data is digital, preparation times are shorter, and it doesn’t take a lot of resources to produce different versions of the same label.
Compared to conventional presses, the set-up time before each job is much shorter for digital printers, resulting in lower turnaround times. This makes digital presses suitable for smaller runs.
Hybrid printing
You can opt for a single printing technique, but why choose if you can have the best of both worlds? Or actually many worlds.
You can not only print a wide variety of products, but also products that are unique. You have opportunities at your disposal your competitors most likely won’t have. And it also allows you to take full advantage of the strengths of each technique.
All in one pass
A hybrid press, such as the EF SYMJET combines the best of flexo and digital printing technologies. The
biggest advantage, beside the lower turnaround time, is the opportunity to add flexo colours, converting
and finishing, all in one pass. With a hybrid printing press, there is no more need for separate finishing equipment. A hybrid press gives you the opportunity to print a complete label, all in-line. With this in mind, think about all the advantages that come along; lower operator costs, less waste, less logistic operations, etc.
Hybrid printing can be the perfect solution for short to medium label runs. For printing larger label runs, another technique, such as flexo, could be a better fit. Are you curious what the best solution for your business would be? Our specialist are happy to help! Click here to contact us, and talk to a specialist.
After reading this blog, I hope you understand why an innovative printing technique like hybrid printing helps you to optimise your printing process — and make it future-proof. But it’s not the only method you can consider; there are more factors that affect the viability of your printing process.
If you’d like to receive an indication on this viability, we have a useful tool that helps. It contains 9 short questions based on the different factors influencing the viability. It helps you find out to what extent you should consider implementing process optimisations, and in what areas.
Free whitepaper
Want to know if hybrid printing is the best solution for your company? Download our free whitepaper here.
This whitepaper contains valuable information about:
- Common challenges for label printers
- The difference between conventional, digital and hybrid printing
- The benefits of hybrid printing
- What experts say about hybrid printing
- When hybrid is the best solution for you
- MPS' hybrid solution
