L&L turns 40: Warm welcome for new magazine

After months of behind the scenes activity and planning the first edition of Labels and Labelling is finally published. Although originally envisaged as a twelve page journal, response to the initial mailing of promotional material has been so encouraging that the first edition is being published with twenty pages of news, views and features. 

Letters of support, encouragement and good wishes have come from all over the UK, from Europe, and from as far afield as Australia and America, making the initial mailing list truly international. FINAT, the International Federation of Manufacturers and Converters of Pressure Sensitive and Thermoplastic Adhesives on Paper and Other Base Materials, have also indicated their support and good wishes for the journal and a message from their chairman is reproduced above. 

The aim of the journal is to provide a forum for all those who are concerned with label materials or machinery, with the printing and production of labels, and with the use of labels in a wide range and variety of applications. Readers range from sales and marketing executives, technical specialists, designers and engineers of supply and production companies, to packaging buyers and purchasing officers of user organisations. These include food and drug companies, supermarkets, cosmetics manufacturers and packaging groups, as well as many professional and technical associations and libraries. 

It is hoped to balance each issue with introductory and technical information and articles, with marketing data and user requirements, and with a wide range of label applications. Regular features will include label news, a company feature and forthcoming events. 

A great many people have either written or filled in the promotional form to say that they would be pleased to contribute technical articles or editorial items to the journal. This is perhaps a good indication that existing journals are not meeting the needs of the label industry or, at the very least, they do not regard existing journals as being suitable mediums to express their views. Certainly, thanks are extended for the offers of contributions. Hopefully, as many of these offers as possible will be followed up in the coming year. 

As far as the current issue is concerned, we hope readers will let us have their comments or views on the new journal and on what they would like to see as features in future editions. Only then can we begin to make the journal a truly representative forum. 

Finally, thanks must be extended to the many companies and individuals who have committed themselves to giving their support to a new and untried magazine. Hopefully, this issue will lead to others lending their support and encouragement to making the journal a regular feature of the label supply and user industries. 

Read Mike's thoughts on the first 10 years of Labels & Labeling here

*This opinion article was first published in Labels & Labeling issue 1, 1979.

**This transcription is a direct replication of the article as published, and before the magazine adopted an American English style guide with a name change to match

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