Five years ago, Christiansen Print commissioned HP’s PageWide T1100S digital web press in Germany at its Ilsenburg site. At a press event to mark this anniversary, the company gave a positive assessment and emphasised the importance of digital printing for the digitalisation of the entire supply chain.
The requirements for packaging and its printing are becoming ever more stringent. In today’s fast-moving retail landscape even the smallest order quantities must be printed to a high quality and it must also be possible to deliver and personalise them at short notice. Christiansen Print has been providing the right answer to these developments for five years with its digital printing technology.
In 2017 the company installed HP’s first PageWide T1100S at the Ilsenburg site, which at the time was also the largest digital printing system in the world. Since then, Christiansen Print’s customers have benefited from the fast and agile digital printing production processes. These enable the production of high-quality print products which are adapted and delivered at short notice and can also be personalised and customised with an unlimited number of possible print images. For example, packaging can be printed with QR codes that give the end-user access to information about the product it contains and as there is no minimum order quantity, even small orders can be fulfilled using digital printing. This means that only the exact quantities required are actually produced which saves resources in the production process and avoids unnecessary waste.
Over the last five years, digital printing has established itself as a successful printing process at Christiansen Print. “What was still an absolute novelty in 2017 is now an integral part of our print production. We invested very early on in digital printing and the associated opportunities. This has been worthwhile as the technology is increasingly in demand in the market. We are doubling our digital printing volume every year,” reports Michael Weber, Head of Corporate Strategy + Marketing, Thimm Group and Managing Director of Christiansen Print GmbH. “We are driving the digitalisation of our own production workflows towards direct and digital connections with our customers in order to offer them the shortest delivery times and customised print images in conjunction with the smallest order quantities. However, our overarching vision goes much further as our aim is to digitise the entire supply chain from printing on paper to packaging production, right through to the customer and retail outlet. Therefore, digital printing opens up completely new possibilities. For example, thanks to the smart codes printed on the paper rolls, the machines used for corrugated cardboard production and further processing can be controlled automatically.”
