What’s challenging label converters these days?

There have been significant shifts in the label industry over the last number of years. For example, to better differentiate and compete, many brands are using more segmentation and shorter, more frequent seasonal promotions. Some labels add interactive elements to engage and inform consumers, creating an offline-to-online digital experience. And visual elements that pop are increasingly being used to help brands stand out from the crowd.

This all means greater demand for labels, with more agility and shorter turnaround times required of label converters.

According to research by Keypoint Intelligence, on average, label converters are producing 250 jobs per day with same-day or next-day turnaround. That’s a lot of jobs to do quickly. Yet, while 81% of label converters use some automation, manual processes continue to dominate in most departments, with just 19% of respondents reporting that their operations are mostly automated. This is a huge barrier in terms of bottlenecks, potential errors, and waste.

And it’s a problem for the quality control procedures as well. Too often quality control is done during printing, in an ad hoc process that slows things down. The outcome is overly dependent on the operator’s own experience or visual impression for things like colour accuracy or a quality match. Alternately, if quality control is done after the fact, and a defect is found, it can be extremely costly. Likewise, if the incorrect file was printed, this might come to light only after printing has been running from some time.

According to the research of key point, digitisation offers an answer to these challenges. Download the full report to learn more