By Olivia Cahoon
The corrugated packaging market is evolving at a rapid pace with demands for customized, short-run packaging solutions. To keep clients satisfied, packaging manufacturers look for flexibility in ordering and the ability to cost-effectively produce corrugated decorations with fast turnaround times.
Digital printing technologies provide packaging providers with an innovative solution to traditional environments, enabling higher speeds, shorter runs, and customization.
Promoting Digitization
Rondo Ganahl AG is an Austrian family firm established in 1797. The company primarily serves as a manufacturer of corrugated board packaging products, corrugated case material, and paper and packaging collections. Headquartered in Frastanz, Austria, the manufacturer employs 1,490 employees across eight locations.
Its services include customized packaging concepts, logistics, and a complete range of printing options from flexographic printing to offset laminating and direct offset printing. Rondo’s deep portfolio helps the company combine various printing stocks and methods to create the best customized solution for each packaging item.
The corrugated manufacturer produces high-quality corrugated board packaging at seven sites for maximum safety with high-functional capability. Corrugated packaging products include baskets, boxes for automated packaging, compact crates, die-cut packaging, fanfold corrugated board, gift boxes, glued packaging, instant bottom boxes, octabins, pallet boxes, slotted case, trays, and tuck-in crates.
In 2018, Rondo Ganahl became the first company to install the Durst Delta SPC 130 printing system. With this device, the corrugated board manufacturer produces packaging and displays with offset and flexographic technologies at six locations. It also intends to setup a digital center at its Raab, Austria branch.
Based on Durst single-pass printing technology, the Durst Delta SPC 130 reaches print speeds up to 100,000 square feet per hour and handles boards with a maximum 0.47-inch thickness. It is equipped with Durst’s SPC drop on demand printhead technology and has a non-hazardous ink system and an IR/UV drying process designed for high productivity. In combination with Durst Water Technology and a marking-free ink system, the device enables sustainable and odorless packaging products in the food retail sector.
After initial customer installations of the Delta WT 250 multi-pass printing system, Durst developed the Delta SPC 130 high-performance printing system. It is based on the same technology it deploys in its label printing and ceramics printing segments. In addition to producing more cost-efficient shelving and sales packaging in small- and medium-sized job runs, the device also supports customizations directly and without setup costs.
With its investment, Rondo Ganahl responds to evolving demands in the corrugated board market, which require rapid and flexible solutions for sampling, versioning, and personalizing promotional activities. It also helps the company respond to trade and brand manufacturers seeking partners that offer support for seasonal promotions, special editions, and individual products in a timely and high-quality manner.
Other print providers in Austria recognize these demands in the corrugated market and have also invested in the Durst Delta WT corrugated multi-pass printing systems. Rondo Ganahl furthers this innovation by relying on industrial productivity and scalability with its Delta SPC 130 single-pass technology.
Capturing Business Opportunities
Founded in 1903, Panhuijsen Packaging is a family business that started as a small trading company with a diverse product offering. Over the years, it grew from a packing and binding twine business into a packaging material wholesaler.
Panhuijsen Packaging is now headquartered in Tilburg, Netherlands and offers a variety of packaging materials, including boxes, containers, pallets, and shipping boxes. It also sells packaging devices, such as box closing machines, packing tables, pallet wrappers, seal and shrink devices, strapping machines, and vacuum packaging machines.
The manufacturer has a history of providing wholesale packaging and related services to customers. With a growing customer base in Europe’s Benelux region, it consistently looks for new business opportunities from many different markets. In 2016, the company decided to provide a new offering—servicing smaller-sized ecommerce companies that require 100 packages per year.
To reach this market, the packaging supplier purchased the Memjet-powered Xante Excelagraphix 4200 inkjet printing system. It provides the speed, color, and personalization capabilities Panhuijsen Packaging needed to offer customized packaging services to a growing customer base.
Powered by Memjet’s Waterfall Printhead Technology, the Xante Excelagraphix 4200 employs a stationary printhead bar system for single-pass printing speeds up to 416 corrugated flat sheets per hour. It handles corrugated flat sheets, die-cut sheets, and folded and glued regular slotted containers up to 42 inches wide with a maximum 5/8-inch thickness.
With this investment, the Xante Excelagraphix 4200 enables Panhuijsen Packaging to expand its business with a fast, cost-effective method for producing colorful, personalized packaging in short runs.
“No other company could offer the speed and quality the Excelagraphix 4200 provides. Now that we have the in-house technology, we see more possibilities for our customers—and our business,” shares Michiel Van Dijk, owner, Panhuijsen Packaging.
With the Xante Excelagraphix 4200, the packaging supplier takes advantage of digital technology and produces professional, four-color, branded packages for an entirely new customer segment.
High Output Quality
Israeli-based Carmel Frenkel, a subsidiary of Hadera Paper, specializes in providing cardboard packaging solutions for display and shelving. The company’s products are designed for a variety of clients, including cosmetic, food, gaming, high tech, metal, pharmaceutical, plastic, and textile industries. It offers a range of services from design and printing to customer site delivery.
The packaging manufacturer handles and transports thousands of tons of cardboard every year. Part of its success is due to a variety of solutions, including various printing technologies such as flexographic, offset, and digital.
In 2018, Carmel Frenkel purchased an EFI Nozomi C18000 single-pass, ultra-high-speed LED inkjet corrugated packaging press. It is one of the first companies worldwide to have the complete EFI ecosystem for corrugated production with the Nozomi press, EFI Fiery NZ-1000 digital front end (DFE), EFI Corrugated Packaging Suite manufacturing execution system (MES) business and production management workflow, and EFI Escada corrugated control software.
The EFI Nozomi C18000 press features a single-pass, piezoelectric grayscale inkjet writing system for high-quality output and high-fidelity color, including consistent reproduction on solid areas. It delivers operating speeds up to 10,000 35×35-inch boards per hour two-up.
Carmel Frenkel chose the Nozomi C18000 after closely examining available digital production systems. “We are committed to staying on the leading edge of packaging technology. That is the main reason why we went for the Nozomi press,” comments Guy Frenkel, CEO, Carmel Frenkel.
While shopping for a new printing press, the packaging company invested considerable time and effort in evaluating the most advanced digital corrugated technologies. With this press, Frenkel is assured that EFI is delivering an innovative technology that handles a variety of print jobs with faster throughput and high output quality.
Carmel Frenkel also intends to use the Nozomi C18000 press to reduce turnaround times for new projects and to produce smaller quantities and job versions—a task that is currently too costly to achieve with its analog production methods.
The 71-inch wide Nozomi press is equipped with the EFI Fiery NZ-1000 DFE print server and production system. It provides efficient job management and the ability to produce versioned/multi-SKU work and personalized packaging at full speed. The Corrugated Packaging Suite MES workflow that Carmel Frenkel also installed facilitates plant-wide management and integration of digital production for a full, end-to-end business and production framework.
The complete EFI ecosystem of corrugated production options and products offers innovative capabilities that Carmel Frenkel uses to provide customers with faster response times and high-quality products.
Packaging Made Perfect
Corrugated packaging is no longer an exclusive market for offset and flexographic printing. Today’s industrial digital presses offer the ability to produce high-quality, short runs, and customizable capabilities that reduce turnaround time and provide value-added packaging.
Packaging manufacturers like Carmel Frenkel, Panhuijsen Packaging, and Rondo Ganahl take notice and invest in digital solutions to create new business opportunities and keep current clients satisfied.
Mar2019, Industrial Print Magazine