Launch of ‘Label Experts’ – the new knowledge portal for label printing

Packaging Solutions

Labels give products their identity and influence the impulse to buy at the point of sale. Accounting for around 5% of the global print volume of approximately €400 billion, today the label market has the greatest growth potential in the printing industry, and has evolved from a niche segment to a sizable industry over the last few decades. The associated knowledge base has also greatly increased hand in hand with this evolution, and today is differentiated on the basis of a remarkable variety of different printing technologies, applications, substrates and further consumables.

In the digital age it was just a matter of time before the stakeholders in this industry bundled this knowledge and made it available on a digital platform.

A new knowledge portal, in English, for all things label printing, can be found at www.label-experts.com. This expert forum was started as a joint project between Heidelberg and its subsidiary Gallus.

‘Heidelberg’s strength lies in its knowledge of its customers and their issues,’ explained Professor Dr Ulrich Hermann, member of the management board responsible for lifecycle solutions and chief digital officer at Heidelberg. ‘This is where our future customer communication begins, not just with the product. Our customers in the label printing industry will be able to access exclusive expert knowledge with this platform presence. Only if we are able to prove to our customers that we understand the label printing industry, will our customers continue to place their trust in us for their most important investment decisions.’

In a highly dynamic environment, the requirements for label solutions are changing faster and faster nowadays. Following the trend of customisation, the market is increasingly demanding shorter runs as well as versioned and localised labels. Distinguishing features are becoming more and more important, thus the demand for just in time deliveries and labels with unusual embellishments is growing. For the latter, more and more creative formats are being found: labels as on-pack promotion deliver advertising messages in the smallest of spaces and can be broadened from a leaflet to a mini brochure. Special effects are produced using inks that light up in the dark or heat sensitive inks that are visible within a limited temperature range. The wealth of variants is almost infinite. The variety of the applications is matched only by the multi-faceted nature of the content on www.label-experts.com. Awaiting users of this platform are newsletters, technical articles, the latest market research results, white papers, tips for their next investment, and much more.