FINAT publishes 4th edition industry report

FINAT’s End-user Market Survey and Industry Report has been published at the organizations’ annual congress on June 10-12. This fourth edition, revised and expanded, is aimed at being an ‘invaluable data bank for every player in the label industry value chain’, whether converter, press and ancillaries manufacturer, self-adhesive laminator or raw material supplier as well as the many users of self-adhesive labels around the world.
 
There is a reduced 400 euros price for FINAT members compared with the 3,000 euros for non-members, with discounts for bulk purchases.
 
The survey, prepared by AWA Alexander Watson Associates, takes a close look at present market conditions which, in 2008, saw label laminate demand at one third of the world’s total production. Within the label segment of product decoration technologies, self-adhesive labels are dominant, accounting for 45 percent of the total European market for labels, according to the report.
 
Although last year started off encouragingly, the sharp declines later in the year saw the volume total decline by one percent over 2007 and the survey forecasts a further decline of about two percent in 2009, followed by a period of static volumes in 2010 before the start of a modest recovery in 2011.
 
The longer term forecast for 2008-2013 is for an annual growth rate of 0.5 percent to one percent, with the general market trend closely matching GDP growth.
 
‘In general, the European market for self-adhesive labels is a maturing market, possessing all the characteristics that define such a market, including a flattening growth curve, high penetration levels in key end use markets, slowing of innovation, declining margins and pressures on costs as well as consolidation and rationalization,’ the survey states.
 
While ten companies supply more than 90 percent of all the self-adhesive labelstock laminates in Europe, there are an estimated 3,000 printers/converters producing the labels in the reel. The majority are small and supply local or national needs.
 
There is evidence of continuing consolidation and larger print groups are steadily evolving, but at a slow rate. It is estimated that about 100 companies will be subject to merger/acquisition or bankruptcy in 2009.
 
The survey takes a detailed sector-by-sector examination as well as examining the picture on a regional basis.
 
Looking at the next four years, the survey forecasts Central and Eastern Europe (including Russia) to be the main growth areas, with expansion expected to be between one and one-and-a-half percent, Southern Europe and the Nordic countries growing by up to half a percent but Western Europe dwindling by between half and one percent.
 
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