Digitally printed salad pot lids, now onsale at Waitrose
The first digital print on lidding film for food products in the UK hit Waitrose shelves in ealry October, produced by Shere Print using its HP Indigo WS6600 press. Digital print pioneers Shere produced film for the Mediterranean Salad Bowl, in partnership with Waitrose and Wingland Foods. It has been a high profile project for all of the teams involved. Wingland Foods stated: “We are delighted to be launching this trial with Waitrose and congratulate Shere Print on solving the technical obstacles and we look forward to exploring the full potential of digital print in the future.”
The development of digital print for the flexible packaging sector has seen support from both retail buyers and major brand owners. The production time for packaging can be greatly reduced as design files can be sent straight to the press with no additional set up. SKU proliferation is easy with digital print as different designs can be printed consecutively with no change over. This gives added flexibility when printing small volumes and greater reactivity to market conditions, enabling more promotional activity with no packaging stock write off. “Digital print requires no plates or extended set up, so we are able to give our customers shelf ready packaging within hours,” according to Chris Tonge, Sales and Marketing Director of Ultimate Packaging and Shere Print.
