Premium retail brands grow with Xerox – TRESU inline digital print and coating workflow

The Alexir Partnership, the Edenbridge, UK-based supplier of folding carton packaging, is helping niche and premium food brands reduce stocks and succeed internationally with targeted, diversified product offerings in short runs, as a result of its Xerox – TRESU digital printing and coating line.

The company became the first major supplier in the UK with an inline solution for digitally printed folding cartons, when it installed the four-colour Xerox iGen 4 sheet-fed digital printer with a TRESU Pinta coater integrated inline in 2015. Complementing an existing offset workflow, the integrated, single-pass digital printing – coating line is capable of up to 110 sheets / minute and printing carton up to 610µm thickness, enabling printing on-demand with low origination costs and low order quantities.

Alexir’s digital division has become a self-sufficient unit, employing six full-time staff. As Claire Summersby, marketing manager at the Alexir Partnership, explains, it is meeting the growing demand for short production runs. “Our Xerox – TRESU printing and coating line is filling a vital gap of between one and five thousand units, which we were unable to offer before. For brand owners, it provides a much faster route to market, allowing us to offer high-value services, like on-demand sample printing, personalised prints and multiple variations of a brand. It has attracted significant business from small market players and provided start-up companies with a springboard for growth. Furthermore, we are increasingly supporting marketing departments of larger brand-owners, by developing promotional campaigns,” he said.

Dragonfly Tea, based in Newbury, UK, is benefiting from the cost-effectiveness and flexibility of Alexir Partnership’s digital carton service for its range of speciality black, green, white and caffeine-free tea sachets that are sold across the E.U.

TRESU’s Pinta inline flexo coater provides a layer of protection and enhances aesthetic appeal. Sheets are fed to the coater automatically, from the Xerox iGen 4, immediately after the printing stage. A wide range of UV- or water-based coating media, supplied by TRESU, are available for achieving matte, gloss, full surface, spot or fine-line effects. Fast sleeve-changes and an automatic, self-cleaning coating supply system limit job changeover times to just minutes even when switching between UV and water-based varnishes. Coated sheets are subsequently transferred to the adjacent KAMA ProFold 74 gluer / folder or Kongsberg plotter.