hubergroup to supply Carlsberg with healthy printing inks for beer labels

These ‘Greener Green’ inks form part of Carlsberg’s ambitious sustainability program, TogetherTowardsZero, through which the company is working to make its products more sustainable and allow consumers to live more sustainable lives. To that end, Carlsberg looked at the entire value chain to improve every part of its packaging, including the ink used for its beer labels. hubergroup has previously introduced globally a range of cradle-to-cradle (C2C) certified inks and coatings for offset and gravure printed products.

Carlsberg brand director Julian Marsili said: ‘Printing inks have major impacts on the recyclability of packaging because they are often recycled along with paper fibers.

‘To improve the recyclability of Carlsberg labels in selected markets, we are using the hubergroup Eco-Offset Ink Premium Plus, which is C2C certified at the silver level.’

This development was revealed during the recent Healthy Printing Symposium 2018 in Lüneburg, Germany. The printing company Töpfer has also been involved in the project, which has run under the scientific supervision of the Environmental Protection Encouragement Agency (EPEA).

Douglas Mulhall, C2C expert and responsible for the Carlsberg project at EPEA, said: ‘Carlsberg and its suppliers are committed to a roadmap for continuous improvement, which is at the core of healthy printing. Instead of just stopping at one certification, Carlsberg and its suppliers are continuing to improve and scale up the rollout of these inks. Especially the introduction into Asian markets is an impressive achievement.’

Bern Groh, global product and portfolio manager, SF/UV at hubergroup, stated: ‘As one of the first global ink manufacturers, we have taken up the challenge of redesigning our standard sheet-fed offset and liquid ink portfolio to C2C certification. And with great success as you can see with the Carlsberg project, which was possible in no small part by the strong support of the Healthy Printing Initiative, founded by EPEA in Hamburg, which is one of the most important platforms to enable sustainable printing for packaging manufacturers and printers.’

This also follows Carlsberg overhauling its seconday packaging with Snap Pack, a new way of collating multipacks of cans using adhesive dots.