Print and apply labellers aim to eliminate the need for employees to print and stick labels onto products and packaging. Instead, labels carrying barcodes, serial numbers, QR codes, personalised message and graphics can be applied directly to packaging. This gives manufacturers the ability to print and apply labels on demand, potentially reducing storage needs for stock and product variant labels.

Print and apply labelling is said to offer advantages for production operations as it is seen to be potentially faster and more reliable than manual applications. It is also said to reduce waste, labour and possible operator errors, as well as running costs and downtime. 

The 2200 Series of print and apply labellers from Markem-Imaje are locally available from Pyrotec PackMark. The series is said to give customers a range of interchangeable applicators, optimised operational intervention and improved application rate.

The main benefits of the series are listed as follows:

• print and application rates of up to 125 packs
• A standard 18-month warranty with up to a five-year warranty extension
• Operators are able to quickly reload label and ribbon rolls
• The 560 m ribbon and label rolls compared to market standards of 450 m, help to reduce line stoppages

The company states that when the labeller is operated in conjunction with its software solutions, product data integrity can be ensured. The unit can also then be connected to central data management and enterprise databases.

The colour touchscreen terminal aims to facilitate the selection of labels to be printed and an intuitive user interface facilitates data management.

In addition, the labellers are designed to be more than 95% recyclable, they have a built-in real-time clock, ten individual programmable counters and a choice of thermal or direct thermal print methods. The series also supports most linear barcodes and 2D barcodes.

Applicators come in a choice of tamp, blow, wipe or tamp blow for top, side and front applications and offer corner wrap for two adjacent side applications.