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Latest news from Packaging Innovations & Empack
Where form marries function
From bespoke constructions and unusual formats to personalised and embellished packs, there are many ways to have your brand standout on the shelf.
Solutions and services to make packaging your own are essential to securing success whether you’re selling through bricks and mortar retail or using e-commerce channels to reach your target market.
Whether you’re after cartons, pouches, and tins moulded and folded into any shape imaginable (within reason) or personalised labels and packaging for gifting and enriched consumer engagement, there’s an almost endless array of options to choose from.
At Packaging Innovations & Empack 2025, attendees will have access to the full array of solutions that can give labels, pouches, cartons and cans the edge to better market and sell everyday FMCG staples, kitchen essentials, occasional sweets and treats, and high-end wines and spirits.
Taking shape
Once the likes of Sun Branding (B62) or Studio One Eleven, the design and innovation division of Berlin Packaging (B54), have helped nail down the artwork and design of your product and pack, it’s time to bring it to life.
Let’s start with your substrate choice. These days, a brand’s material choice is immaterial to their ability to have a genuinely unique appearance. You name it and somebody somewhere can blow, mould and shape it into the pack you desire.
For example, Lyte Packaging (Q54) uses 400gsm two-side coated card to create spherical boxes for consumer and luxury brands, while Tinpac (H80) can design, manufacture and supply tins in almost any shape and size. Spherical, elliptical, and custom-shaped tins for confectionery customers are options, as are tall, long, fat, thin, or squat tins for tea, coffee, beverage, bakery, personal care and pet food products.
Spectra Packaging (M40) is an independent manufacturer of rigid plastic packaging for the toiletries, cosmetics and personal care markets. A comprehensive range of off-the-shelf standard bottle and cap designs are complemented by a bespoke custom moulding and tooling service. This bespoke service is evidenced through its work with Beached and the creation of custom tooled bottles for the beauty brand made out of 100% post-consumer recycled (PCR) HDPE. Extrusion blow moulding was used to create an ergonomic pebble-like profile with a small footprint. This process suits those seeking more elaborate and challenging designs for their bottles. In addition, and despite the use of 100% recycled content, Spectra was able to achieve bright bold blue and red packs, courtesy of expert colour matching capability.
Clifton Packaging (A50) has more than four decades of experience in crafting and creating flexible packaging solutions for brands in the snack, wet protein, and other food markets. This includes shaped pouches for snack products that give products a unique selling point and create impact on the shelf. These pouches are available in bespoke shapes and sizes, finished with a tactile varnish or supplied as a textured film to create a paper-effect, and with a variety of functional elements to enhance their performance – high barrier, spouts, and zippers, etc. High-definition flexo printing in up to eight colours to complement custom shaped packs with high-quality graphics.
For those opting for more challenging shapes, Perigon (R76) offers a process that allows complex 3D objects such as glass bottles and even kitchen appliances to be decorated over their entire surface. This is done in brilliant colour with pin-sharp clarity and free of distortion, regardless of the base material. First, high-quality thermoformable films are digitally printed with special inks. The product to be printed is then loaded into a vacuum oven along with the printed film. As the oven temperature Is increased, so the film becomes soft and flexible, and when a vacuum is applied the soft film moulds to the object. Via the process of diffusion, the printed image is transferred to the object. Vacuum ovens are available for individual items and short runs up to larger volumes and mass production.
Drawn to digital
While the Perigon process does involve digitally printing of the desired image to be transferred, it is not a truly digital direct-to-shape process as you might expect.
Nonetheless, digital technologies are ideally placed to meet the demand for shorter runs, smaller batches and personalisation. Today these opportunities are available to brands of all size, with many printers and converters already operating toner-based and inkjet print processes.
As a global business, All4Labels (V64) has a variety of digital technologies at its disposal, from the high-speed HP Indigo V12 to UV inkjet printing for tactile and high-quality and vibrant prints. It also uses digital embellishment to complement the digital printing of labels and packaging, further emboldening brands in their pursuit of the greatest visual impact and aesthetic appeal.
Abbey Labels (L60) similarly uses digital – Xeikon’s dry toner technology more specifically – to produce self-adhesive labels for food and drink customers. Digital capacity is complemented by comprehensive finishing and converting technology that can be used to create differentiated labels, such as peel and reveal and multilayer products.
Durham Box (P70) continues to deliver success to brands with its use of EFI’s Nozomi single-pass corrugated printer. Using UV LED inks, odourless print is achieved, while the use of white on Kraft board helps create eye-catching effects. Being digital, campaigns and customisation can be easily actioned, while the agility of the process allow brands respond to market changes quickly and with minimal disruption to their packaging supply chain.
Highcon (V86) is a developer and manufacturer of digital die-cutting systems for carton and corrugated packaging. Its Euclid and Beam systems allow intricate patterns to be cut into sheets to rapidly create complex designs at increasingly smaller production volumes. Conversely, its newest development, Vulcan, is designed for mainstream corrugated production and will allow throughput akin to existing analogue systems, but with the full versatility and flexibility that digital technologies can allow.
The power of digital to elevate packaging transcends mechanical processes, as evidenced by the partnership between Hybrid Software, Infigo, and Cerm (V54). The Innovation Inn returns to their stand at Packaging Innovations & Empack 2025, where the potential and power of fully integrating a web-to-print storefront, MIS software and pre-press workflow as an all-in-one streamlined workflow will be showcased. This ensures a seamless transfer of data and operations between the three platforms, greatly minimising manual interventions, reducing operational costs and streamlining the production of high value labels and packaging.
As evidenced here, at Packaging Innovations & Empack 2025 you can let your imagination run and wild. Down each and every aisle you’ll find a solution to make your wildest dreams a reality or at least a partner willing and able to bring them to life.
Registering online for the free-to-attend two-day exhibition is highly recommended as the 12 & 13 February event nears and upwards of 7,000 likeminded attendees prepare to descend on the NEC Birmingham.
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Latest news from Packaging Innovations & Empack
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