Web-Fed Materials

In a nutshell, “web-fed materials” are materials being continuously fed into the flexographic press from large rolls of raw material stock.

Using rolls of materials instead of individual sheets allow us to quickly print large orders, cutting to the desired final product at a separate station.

With our “flexo” presses, we can print an average of 80 meters per minute. Flexographic printing is significantly faster than digital, making larger runs of labels more cost-effective to print on flexo presses.

Our main speciality is flexographic printing

Flexographic printing is a popular method for printing large orders of custom labels at rapid speeds. 

Unlike digital label printing, flexographic printing transfers ink onto the material using flexible printing plates mounted on fast-rotating cylinders.

Flexographic printing plates allow customization options that aren’t possible with some other types of presses. 

Flexible Printing Plates

Printing “plates” are thin sheets of polymer material, laser engraved with an image of your digital artwork.

These plates are wrapped around cylinders and installed on the press where they get coated with ink that then transfers onto the web-fed material; each color being printed requires it’s own plate. 

(a one-time fee applies)

CMYK Printing + Color Options

Full-color labels can be achieved with 4-color process printing which refers to these ink colors: cyan, magenta, yellow and “key” (printing term for black). It’s important to design your label artwork in CMYK colors – not RGB!

Screens on computers, smartphones, and tablets use RGB (red, green, blue) colors and can look different from one screen to another due to different displays. 

CMYK inks are usually enough to achieve most colors, however, we can also print color variations through Pantone color matching.

Cutting Dies

After the labels are printed, the next step is to cut them to the desired final shape. “Cutting dies” are metallic cylinders with shallow blades on the surface that slices the label shape into the material so that excess material around the labels can be removed. We have hundreds of cutting dies in our inventory and offer the option to create a custom cutting die for you (a one-time fee applies)

Water-Based and Ultraviolet Curable Inks

Water-based and UV curable inks are our go-to systems since they offer great print quality and are less harmful to the environment than solvent inks.

Our most popular option is water-based inks as they are less expensive and work on a variety of materials.

UV inks are a more specialized type of ink, which are cured by an ultraviolet lamp, turning them from liquid into solid. This process is much faster than air drying. UV inks offer easier press setups  since they dry nearly instantaneously.

The quick drying time produces sharper colors; the only drawback of UV inks is that it tends to cost more than other ink types.