Durst Tau 150 completes successful beta test

Omnilabel BV of Dalfsen in the Netherlands has been confirmed as the first converter to take delivery of the new Durst Tau 150 UV inkjet label printer. The machine was installed last year for Beta testing and six months later Omnilabel says it is ‘delighted’ by the performance of the Tau.

‘Durst has been very supportive,’ said managing director Michiel Smudde. ‘The people at Durst have given us a lot of confidence in both the machine and their ability to respond to any unforeseen issue. The Tau is not only printing reliably and profitably but also it has given us a commercial boost, which was the major reason for purchasing the machine.’

Omnilabel was established in 1997 by leading Dutch packaging converter Eshuis to provide small and medium volumes of printed and blank labels. It still provides labels to Eshuis, but now that only represents a small part of the business, with most coming from a large number of private clients.

‘The company prides itself on printing labels of excellent quality from large quantities of many millions to small volumes of a few hundred or thousands,’ continued Michiel Smudde. ‘We also offer the highest flexibility and very fast delivery. Printing of blank labels still represents about 70 percent of our business but we are always looking to invest in new printing technology that will help to improve the service we provide and help to add value to the products we supply. The increasing demand for short runs has led us to evaluate various digital inkjet label presses to find the best possible option that would fit our current requirements and also offer good potential for future growth.’

Smudde continued: ‘The Tau 150 was the best solution. Apart from its ability to provide very fast turn round of the highest quality, the Durst UV ink also offers excellent color retention and allows for outdoor applications. The Tau has proven to supply a good entry into potential new customers and has already been responsible for us winning several new contracts. One example is for labeling flowers for outdoor display at a major chain of garden centres and another is for a milk producer who is about to launch the largest European brand of butter. The Tau enabled us to print sample labels of the butter from a PDF supplied by the customer whilst we discussed the project with them. Instead of taking three days to create proofs of the labels, it took us just a couple of hours. The customer was so impressed by our response time and quality of the samples that we were immediately awarded the contract.’

Smudde says that Omnilabel continued to grow throughout the recession period and expects to continue that growth over the next twelve months. ‘We believe that the Tau 150 is responsible for actually speeding our growth whilst helping us to add value to the products we supply. Currently the factory is operating three shifts a day to meet the current demand.’

Ominlabel services more than 800 customers, all with varying label requirements from 100 to 100 million items, so the company needs to be able to respond quickly and flexibly. ‘Most of our orders are supplied within three days, even the large volume ones and the Tau helps us to satisfy this demand,’ confirms Smudde. ‘We will typically be required to print a large volume of blank labels and then overprint in color just 20 or 30 items in batches for use as hang tags, for example. We supply one such customer with between 600 and 700 different orders per year.’    

The Tau 150 features Durst’s proprietary single pass technology and covers web widths from 10 cm to 16.5 cm and utilizes liquid UV ink technology. The system prints at speeds up to 50 m/min and delivers an apparent resolution in excess of 1000 dpi, utilizing grayscale inkjet print head technology from Xaar. 

Durst’s proprietary UV inkjet technology features CMYK ink colors, plus white as an additional configuration option. A broad range of standard substrates are supported without the need for pre and post treatment. Built-in maintenance functions include automated printhead cleaning.

Pictured: Omnilabel managment with the Tau Label Press.

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