Folding carton specialist Benson Group showed off its new labels printing area at its Medica Packaging division at an Open Day in Crewe, Cheshire.
Medica Packaging, which specialises in short-to-medium run printed cartons, patient information leaflets and labels for the pharmaceutical and healthcare markets, is the third largest supplier to the UK pharmaceutical market. Turnover has increased from £12m to £17m in the three years since Benson Box acquired it.
Total group turnover is currently £93m, but the aim is to increase this to £100m through organic growth.
Medica Packaging has installed a Gallus EM340S printing press with a Scantech VisionTrack rewind and inspection machine in a specially built production area, which follows the clean lines required by the pharmaceutical sector.
The company says a key driver behind the installation was customer demand for single-site production of pharmaceutical cartons, leaflets and labels.
"Single-site production helps to ensure consistency of print quality across all three elements and offers one audit trail and colour/quality consistency," said David Devenport, group sales director at Benson Group.
The £1m seven-colour Gallus UV flexographic press is capable of a wide range of label production formats, including reverse printing, printing on adhesive, edge slit, in-line die-cutting, as well as onto a range of materials from paper to unsupported film, in weights from 25 to 400µg. Other printing processes and label formats, such as silkscreen, foil blocking and "peel "n" read", can be added at any time.
The company uses benzophenone-free, low-odour printing inks, which are suitable for both pharmaceutical and food packaging requirements. The average production speed of the press is 80m/min.
Medica Packaging has also invested in a press comparator system from Surfscan Technologies that compares the "first off" print production pass from the Gallus press with a customer-approved PDF. Medica believes it is the first company in the country to be able to do this.
Checkproof, Checkrewind and Checkpress Colour inspect all pharmaceutical labels 100% of the time. The vision system also has the ability to re-inspect labels to ensure that all waste is removed and to verify barcodes and consecutively number each label all in one pass.
The company has also updated its die-cutting, label applicators, glue lines and leaflet folders in a total investment of £1.85m in 2008/09.
Labels are not a large part of Medica Packaging's business as yet. Devenport says the budget for next year is for cartons to account for 69% of turnover, leaflets 29% and labels 1%, with creative services also contributing 1%. The turnover target for the company in 2009/10 is £20m.
Devenport added that there is potential for a second Gallus press to be installed once labels reach 4-5% of turnover.
"The immediate aim is to maximise output in cartons and gear up a second production site. In the longer term we aim to expand and grow our market share in leaflets, while growing the labels business with the aim of requiring a second press at Medica," he added.
Medica Packaging was also the first plant in the UK to install Bobst's AccuBraille system for the Braille embossing of pharma cartons. Its main benefits are that it shortens the supply time to get cartons to customers, and makes it easier to maintain the quality of the company's Braille embossing.
Conventional Braille embossing is applied using a die-cutter, either at the same time as cutting and creasing or as a separate process. One embossing die is required for each carton on the sheet.
The company says the AccuBraille unit, which is fitted onto the company's Bobst Alpina II carton folder-gluer, alleviates a number of difficulties in Braille embossing using a die-cutter, such as setting and maintaining good Braille dot embossing; the restriction on embossing no closer than 5mm to a cut or crease line; and the problems caused at the folder-gluer feeder when feeding Braille embossed blanks.
Make-ready for the AccuBraille unit is only 10-15min and the rotary process is low impact, so tools last much longer. Only one embossing tool is required per job, instead of one per blank station, which cuts tooling costs even further.
With all pharmaceutical packaging destined for the EU required to contain information in Braille by 2010, AccuBraille represents a quick and easy route to compliance, says the company.