Villalba delivers digital luxury to Mexico

GraficaVillalba entered the digital label printing business five years ago with an investment in an HP Indigo ws4500 digital toner press and an AB Graphic Digicon Series II finishing line – and zero customers. The label converting business operates as Digitalprint GraficaVillalba in Mexico City, one of the largest cities in the world with a population of 24 million people.

It focuses on providing high quality labels to the premium craft beverage segments that’s fashionably emerging in Mexico, as well as the pharmaceutical, health & beauty and food sectors.

GraficaVillalba is the exclusive distributor for Flint printing plates in Mexico and produces flexographic plates for wide web flexible package printing and special dies for corrugated board. GraficaVillalba CEO

Adalberto Villalba wanted to get into the printing business and looked to partner with Martin Rodriguez. Rodriguez, with 15 years’ experience in the industry, has served as an operations manager in two renowned Mexican package printing enterprises, Flexoprint in Guadalajara (now part of MCC) and CCL in Mexico City, managing production across multiple print processes and converting requirements.

‘By entering the narrow web market we do not compete with our customers, and with digital printing, we had the chance to produce something that no one else was doing,’ says Villalba. ‘We anticipate growth of 20 percent this year.’

Today Digitalprint serves more than 350 customers across the country, running six days per week with three shifts and a single shift on Sunday. The business operates with two HP Indigo WS6600 presses supported by two AB Graphic Digicon Series II finishing lines. Wine, beer and liquor (tequila and mezcal) currently account for 29 percent of business output, which represents around 35 percent of revenue. The converter produces private labels for local chefs and others in the hip and trend-setting scene. Digitalprint general manager Martin Rodriguez attributes half of Digitalprint's growth to positive word of mouth shared by existing customers.

Emergence of Craft in Mexico

Explains Rodriguez, ‘Craft beer and boutique beverage producers are very small, but we have hundreds in the country and they’re looking for the right service, and we can provide that.'

Wine in Mexico

There are three main wine-producing regions

in Mexico. The Baja area generates ninety

person of Mexico’s wines while the state of

Coahuila is the oldest wine-producing area.

Ensenada region:

Baja California

Baja area:

Coahuila

Chihuahua

Central region:

Queretero

Guanajuato

Zacatecas

Aguascalientes