Label Products invests in Baldwin’s equipment

Burnsville, Minnesota-based Label Products specializes in a full range of label manufacturing for industries ranging from pharmaceutical and beverage to consumer and industrial products. Its specialties, including in-line foil and varnish effects and variable digital print, position Label Products as one of the most capable independent converters in the upper Midwest. 

Label Products VP of operations Mek Paneinh said the company has been overhauling and upgrading multiple facets of its production technology to keep up with customer demand and market growth. He added that the first aspect of the deal reached with Baldwin extends Label Products’ LED strategy to the rest of the production on its Mark Andy presses. 

‘We were sold on LED UV for labels when we converted our first 10-color press with the help of Baldwin’s AMS team in 2018,’ said Paneinh. ‘LED is easier for operators gives us faster press speeds, and the process is whisper quiet. The colors are brilliant, the lamps are rock solid, and it has solved so many of our traditional challenges associated with UV curing lamps, including heat, press speed, and lamp output consistency. Not to mention it’s sustainable, environmentally friendly, and safer for our operators.’

Label Products claims to be the first label converter in the upper Midwest to eliminate traditional arc-lamp mercury-based UV curing from its production process.

The second aspect of the deal is defect detection from Baldwin Vision Systems, which Label Products is deploying across its digital and flexo presses. Baldwin’s Guardian PQV platform provides a high resolution, easy-to-use 100 percent image inspection compatible with several material types, including label and highly reflective foils.

‘Guardian gives us the ability to catch and remove defects quickly before they get downstream and allows us to produce higher quality, more consistent labels for our customers,’ added Paneinh. ‘Baldwin’s background in security print was ideal for where our company is heading, with more and more customers requiring anti-counterfeit and trust codes to be added to their labels.

‘In the past, we would have all these key technologies from multiple vendors on our machines, making it difficult for operators to learn our process. With Baldwin, we are also deploying its AMP IoT Industry 4.0 platform across all of our machines to bring more uniformity to our production process, monitor OEE, and make it easier for operators to switch between machines and stay within our quality targets.’