Labelexpo Europe Reflects Growing Market Optimism

Labelexpo Europe 2013 has reported its largestever edition with record-breaking attendance figures. The show, which took place Sept. 24-27, covered seven of Brussels Expo’s exhibition halls for the first time and attracted 31,795 visitors (up 11% from 2011) from 158 countries (up from 123 in 2011) and just under 600 exhibitors (up from 550 in 2011). Underlining the show’s importance to what is the fastest growing sector of the wider print industry, Labelexpo Europe occupied 31,000 square meters, its largest show floor size in its 33-year history.

As the label and package printing industry’s major platform for product launches, Labexpo Europe 2013 saw the unveiling of more than 150 new products, including presses, ancillaries and consumables.

Numerous market leading exhibitors increased their presence at 2013’s event including Avery Dennison, Durst, EFI, Gallus, HP Indigo, Mark Andy, MPS, Nilpeter, UPM Raflatac and Xeikon. By the end of the show, 86% of the space had already been rebooked for the 2015 edition – the highest ever onsite rebook rate.

Labelexpo Europe 2013 also welcomed the debut of several new busy feature areas. The Package Printing Workshop showcased the opportunities both digital and conventional printing can bring to folding carton, lid laminate and stand up pouch decoration. The Inkjet Trail put the different available inkjet technologies under the spotlight and compared their results when producing identical label designs on the same label stocks.

Labelexpo gathered some quotes from exhibitors, including these from ink manufacturers:

“This year’s Labelexpo Europe was the most exciting and the most rewarding since EFI has been exhibiting at the show,” Paul Cripps, EFI EMEA, reported. “Visitor numbers were up significantly, not just from our own region but also with growing attendance from Asia and Latin America. And the people didn’t come just to kick the tires, they came ready to invest. The new Jetrion with full LED curing and our company’s unique approach to integrated lean manufacturing, gave us record sales leads that will keep our teams busy in the months to come.”

“Labelexpo Europe 2013 was full of energy and overwhelmingly positive,” said Niklas Olsson, Flint Group Narrow Web. “Visitors were full of energy, wanting to learn about the future of narrow web. Flint Group Narrow Web positioned itself at the top. With its win of the New Innovation Award for LED printing inks, and the announcement of the company’s investment in a new combination printing press in Trelleborg, Sweden, Flint Group Narrow Web confirmed its position as a true innovation leader. Visitors from around the world attended our daily Speakers’ Corner seminars wanting to learn more about key trends in the narrow web market – exhibiting a real desire to learn how to position themselves for the future of narrow web.”

“Labelexpo Europe 2013 was a great show for HP. Not only did we close many important customer deals and launch new capabilities, including our new silver ink for the HP Indigo WS6000 series, but we also saw huge interest in our new packaging portfolio and in the many opportunities that digital printing presents to brands,” said Ronen Samuel, HP Indigo and Inkjet Digital Press Solutions EMEA. “Marking HP’s largest Labelexpo presence to date, this year we had our own hall to accommodate our broad press portfolio, and to enable us to integrate HP partners. The aim was to demonstrate ‘end-to-end’ digital solutions, for businesses looking for innovative technologies to support them in their future digital investments. This approach worked very well for us, and we look forward to progressing in the coming weeks and months, the many discussions started at the show.”

“UV LED curing technology was a hot topic at Labelexpo Europe this year,” said Stacy Hoge, Phoseon Technology. “Our high amount of booth traffic from OEMs, ink suppliers and end users interested in UV LED curing technology was really impressive. UV LED for digital inkjet has been gaining worldwide adoption for several years and, there were more than 15 stands running UV LED for digital inkjet at the show. The advancements in UV LED for flexographic printing were also quite impressive. The live flexo presses running UV LED at Labelexpo prove that it is a viable technology for flexographic printing today.”

“Sun Chemical had an extremely successful show at this year’s Labelexpo Europe 2013 with 40% more leads compared to Labelexpo Europe 2011,” said Jonathan Sexton, Sun Chemical. “At this year’s show, we displayed all of our different capabilities for the narrow web label and packaging market on the stand, which resulted in more visitors on the stand at one time than we’ve ever had at a Labelexpo show. Labelexpo Europe was also the launch pad for our new product, SolarFlex Neutron White, which generated great customer interest generating more than 100 inquiries. The geographical breadth of visitors to our stand from more than 70 countries means that we will also looking to extend even further our reach in narrow web into developing regions.”

“Wikoff Color has been a regular exhibitor at Labelexpo Americas; however, this was Wikoff’s first time exhibiting at Labelexpo Europe,” said John Pettus, Wikoff Color. “We attended in order to grow our global customer base and drive additional business to our United Kingdom ink and coating manufacturing operation. The amount of show attendants was impressive, and Wikoff feels our message, culture and product lines were well received in a fairly new market for us. We expect to have a great outcome from the show.”