Epson's digital label show: printing enchants Delhi NCR

Over 30 printers from Delhi NCR, which is one of the printing and packaging hubs in India, were fascinated by the power of digital label printing

Leading names of the industry such as Vikas Ghai (Sterling Printers), Anuj Bhargava (Kumar Labels), Dharamvir Jain (Paras Offset), Rakesh Bagai (Rakesh Press)and Shobhit Bhargava (HBD Packaging) exchanged ideas

Ramu Ramanathan, editor, PrintWeek India: There is a strong need for conclusive statistical data and research about the printing and packaging industry in India

Arvind Sekhar of Sai Packaging, which installed India’s first Epson SurePress L-4033AW for its Bengaluru printing facility, explained his rationale behind opting for digital label press.

Sekhar said he selected the Surepress for five reasons: "ability to print on white ink, no pre-treatment, ability to produce Pantone colour, our short-run jobs for the label segment and Satish Nayak’s guidance”

Sekhar: "In the past few months, we have produced over 150 jobs on the Epson SurePress L-4033AW and haven’t faced even a single rejection"

SM Ramprasad: I prefer to call Epson as digital innovators... Epson believes in automation of manufacturing and digitisation of digital printing.

Ramprasad: At Labelexpo Europe, Epson will launch the SurePress L-6034VW a single-pass digital label press. L-6034VW was first shown as a prototype at Drupa 2012 and is the first Epson product to use LED-curable UV ink.

Ramprasad explained how Epson has played a pivotal role in automation of manufacturing process. "In the last 10 years Epson’s industrial solutions' group (which also manufacturers machines for the printing and packaging industry) has been gaining lot of traction," he said

At the event, a collection of top samples from PrintWeek India 2013 Awards shortlist were exhibited for scrutiny of the delegates

Arvind Sekhar, Dharamvir Jain of Paras Offset, Shobhit Bhargava of HBD Packaging; and Vasudevan and Ramprasad of Epson take a peek at the PrintWeek India Award samples

Satish Nayak of Bodhi discusses the nitty gritty of the Surpress samples with Vikas Ghai of Sterling Printers

During his presentation, Sachin Shardul, technical editor, PrintWeek India highlighted the tech specs of print samples that were submitted at the Awards

Rahul Kumar of PrintWeek India holds up an innovative sample by Mudrika Labels of Mumbai

There was a solid discussion on costing models. Questions from the delegates indicated that operational costing is a pressing concern among converters

Rakesh Bagai of Rakesh Press: How does Sai Packaging decide whether to use flexo or offset or digital press technology for a job?

Sekhar: It is the invoice value that determines the technology not the colour matching. We have already calibrated our digital press to match one-to-one with the colour shades of flexo and Pantone

Anuj Bhargava of Kumar Labels: We use an intermittent letterpress and other ancillary equipment to do short-runs. We were cheaper doing 5,000 labels on our letterpress rather than a digital. So we're still carefully watching and reviewing whether digital is the right technology

Munish Agarwal: Packaging printers in Baddi have not yet tried digital label printing as most of the print jobs Janus caters to has volume - and is not suitable for digital label printing

Bodhi Professional Solutions juxtaposed labels printed on the Surepress along with tradition print jobs and challenged delegates to differentiate between the two

Delegates at the roadshow

The session concluded with lunch and networking where the attendees discussed various touch-points of the event

Arvind Sekhar of Sai Packaging and Tarun Chopra of Colour Dots engage in a discussion about the capabilities and issues of small prints run

Delegates confabulate with Ramprasad of Epson

Ravinder Gupta of PR Packaging shares his feedback about the show with Ramanathan

The maiden Epson roadshow themed, How to be SURE about the Future of Print, concluded on a high note, by creating a forum for knowledge sharing