Group diversity brings rewards to Watershed

If the Dublin production facility is headquarters for The Watershed Group and the core of CEO Liz Waters’ vision for growth through efficient production, then the Etiko plant in Poland and Römer Etikett plant in Germany serve to illustrate the concept that diverse capability, when based on standardized technology, is a powerful tool in today’s competitive market for labels. The common link is Mark Andy as a press manufacturing partner, and the model line is the Performance Series, of which Watershed has five, and counting, in addition to other Mark Andy presses.

When Group founder and former CEO Tom Waters set out to build the group, his philosophy was growth through acquisition, and Etiko Sp. zoo in Szczecin, on Poland’s Baltic coastline, was the first to come under his wing in 2008. Prompted by a request from AB World Foods, which had moved production from the UK to Poland, Watershed went on the acquisition trail. Established in 1992, the company installed its first Mark Andy press, a Scout, in the late 1990s and went on to own three of these 260mm lines. The move to a new factory in 2006 and the installation of a 330mm Mark Andy LP3000 press marked the start of steady growth under the tutelage of Tadeusz Kozinski and drive of sales manager Marek Slojewski that has now seen nine of the St Louis manufactured presses installed over a 16-year period.

The most recent Mark Andy, installed in 2014, is a second servo-driven P5 with a 330mm web width and fitted with eight UV flexo stations, delam/relam, turn bars, cold foil and twin die-cut units. According to Kozinski, it is ideally suited to the short run high quality work that Etiko produces: ‘The Performance Series offers simplicity and ease of operation, which are key values in our day-to-day business.’ The majority of output is for the domestic Polish market, which fits well with the Watershed philosophy of local supply, but being adjacent to Scandinavia, Germany and the Benelux countries, gives Etiko useful export opportunities.

‘We have stayed with the 330mm web width, unlike other group plants which have 430mm Mark Andy presses. This suits our workload of predominantly paper-based self-adhesive and thermal labels. And with average run lengths shortening, the quick and easy job change on the P5 is invaluable. Four jobs per roll and six jobs per shift is the norm here. If we need wider web capacity we can call on it elsewhere in the group.’