The Label Printing Blog

The four-yearly ITMA textile and garment technology expo is the world’s leading event for the international textile industry, showcasing the latest in materials technology and technical innovation – including in textile printing. As such, it is a great opportunity for businesses like us to engage with suppliers, customers and friends in one place – and also to keep up to date with the changes transforming the industry.

Coming up at the end of next month is one of the highlights of our year for exhibitions: Labelexpo Europe 2019. We are delighted to be taking part as exhibitors and really look forward to meeting established customers and building links with new contacts in the industry. This article explains a bit about what we are up to and what you can expect from Focus Label Machinery at Labelexpo.

Focus Label Machinery have completed their latest installation at Advance Labels, Syston, Leicestershire. The family run company, established in 1993, have increased their capabilities with an 8-color, full UV Proflex 330SE servo-driven flexo press.

Image: Tagtrans 225

Serigraphy is the artists' term for silk screen printing, a process which involves a stencil and ink which is forced through a silk screen, although modern versions are often made of nylon or finely woven polyester. One colour is applied at a time and a blade is used to sweep the ink smoothly across the press.

Serigraphy is an extremely ancient form of printing and has been used since the days of the Chinese Song Dynasty (960 - 1279 CE) to transfer exquisite designs to silk material. In modern times, machine-based heat transfer silkscreen printing is used in the textile industry to mass produce attractive prints on fabrics, including t-shirts, curtains, cushion covers and bed linen. Heat transfer is also a popular alternative to sew-in garment labels, especially for underwear and swimming costumes.

Three weeks home from ITMA 2019 in Barcelona and we are still reeling from what turned out to be an incredibly positive and exciting event. Exhibiting at a high profile international event such as this takes plenty of preplanning and hard work – but it was more than worth it for how well attended and well received our exhibition was this year.

Focus are proud to once again be a silver sponsor of this prestigious event celebrating the work of Britain’s premier printers.

Though Flexography has been used in the production of food packaging and labels for use in retail, chemical, pharmaceutical, textiles and service industries for decades, innovation in digital technology continues to drive growth and maintain a positive trend in otherwise challenging times. Much of this success can be attributed to advanced printing equipment but it is the technicians behind the controls who ultimately make the difference between a quality end product and one that fails to meet such high standards.

Labelexpo 2019 will see live demonstrations of the very latest models from Focus Label Machinery Ltd., with Servo & Digital solutions at the forefront, for the short & medium print run business.

A heat transfer is a method of taking a printed image and fixing the image directly to the garment in order to copy the image onto the garment itself. Typically, this technology has been used for customising t-shirts and, more recently, for the application of “tag-less” labels.

The food packaging industry is undergoing something of a cultural shift at present, driven by concerns about sustainability, the saturation of the food market itself, and the increased need to create attractive, cost-effective packaging, which does not inconvenience consumers. This has led to substantial growth in flexible packaging. Flexible packaging encompasses pouches, sachets, bags and other non-rigid packaging types. In this blog post, we examine some of the key advantages of switching to flexible packaging for food products.