Winners of Flint Group Narrow Web Awards announced

Flint Group Narrow Web has announced the winning labels in the fifth annual Narrow Web Print Awards. 

Nearly one hundred entries from label converters from all over the world were evaluated by a panel of industry judges. Criteria for judging followed the guidelines set by the industry associations FINAT and TLMI and included registration, smoothness of dot/vignette, overall print quality and degree of difficulty. In addition, the judges reviewed each label for creative use of inks and color – rewarding those prints that exhibit extra-ordinary use of inks. 

Awards were presented in ten different categories – all prints using inks, coatings and specialty products supplied by Flint Group Narrow Web. ‘This year we were again astonished by the excellence in quality of print and design of all entries. This proves that the Narrow Web Print Awards is held in serious and respected regard by our customers around the world. We are extremely proud, as an ink supplier, to host these awards each year, and receive such a great response from our customers,’ said Niklas Olsson, Flint Group Narrow Web. ‘We truly consider the results achieved with label and narrow web print as fine art. As a supplier, we continue to push the boundaries of narrow web and we are pleased to see that our customers follow this way by also pushing boundaries to create fine art through label printing.’ 

The winning label in the category of UV flexo paper was ‘El Paso Merlot’, pictured, submitted by Alaska Poligrafoformceinie of Russia, which judges said ‘exhibited true excellence in print, design and execution’. The company also won in the UV shrink category, and Flint Group commented that the awards received a very high response from Russia. 

Other winners included:

1        Collotype in Australia in the category of UV offset

2        Skanem in Poland in the category of combination print (UV flexo and UV screen white)

3        Aleithe in Russia in the category of UV flexo film and UV cold foil

4        Labelcrafter in the US in the category of water-based flexo

5        Neoprint in Russia in the category of coupon label 

Mike Buystedt, Flint Group Narrow Web, commented: ‘The quality level of the entries was astonishing. The judging panel had to use all their experience and skill to separate out the winning submissions. Throughout the judging we felt we had to make a choice between several excellent print samples, and decided to honor some entries as highly commended.’ 

The winning entries will be presented with an exclusive award and recognition certificates from their Flint Group Narrow Web local representative. The Narrow Web Print Awards will continue into 2010 at Labelexpo Americas in Chicago.   

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