Postcards, a new world

From WiredPRNews:

Columbine Label Company, Inc. has expanded its label printing options for customers with a HP Indigo WS4500 Digital Press. The custom printing label producer hired four new employees who specialize in running, managing and supporting the equipment, an almost 30 percent increase in company growth.

Columbine Label is one of only three printing companies in Colorado to own an HP Indigo WS4500 Digital custom label press and the only one with traditional Flexographic Label printing capabilities and the HP Indigo Digital advantage. The combination of traditional flexographic label capabilities and digital printing offers our customers more versatile options and allows Columbine Label to handle jobs not typically suited for shorter run digital printing.

“The Digital Press is a significant investment for our company,” said Columbine Label president Greg Jackson. “It has allowed Columbine Label to support new markets and has improved our overall speed and order turn-around to the benefit of all of our customers.”

The Digital Press saves customers time and money with a quick turn-around, economical options for small jobs and minimal job set-up.

Every day, lab managers strive to run productive, efficient labs; after all, important, sometimes life-changing outcomes are on the line. The rising adoption of automation means many processes that were once time-consuming and tedious are now mechanized and reliable, thereby increasing lab productivity.

One area that is easy to overlook is a lab’s system for labeling samples. In this age of rapid technological advancement, it’s no longer good practice to rely on hand labeling or laser custom printing to label tubes, vials, plates and slides-it takes up valuable staff time and the risk of error is too high. Exposure to chemicals can cause ink smears or damage to the label surface itself, leading to mistakes in sample tracking, distortion or adhesive failure.

Because of routine exposure, selecting the right label printing system for the lab is as, if not more, important as selecting quality labware itself. When determining the best label for every lab environment, there are three key considerations: materials, imaging and adhesives.

Polymer is often the best label material because it’s resistant to chemicals and performs well in hot, cold and wet environments. Material flexibility and thickness are important for custom labels applied to irregular surfaces. Thickness is also a key consideration for labware that needs to be placed in holders or racks. For barcode and other high-density data storage images, thermal transfer printing is the optimal choice. It’s the most durable and it won’t smear. Thermal transfer imaging uses a heat-activated ribbon material in the label printer or printing service, which allows users to select the image durability most suitable for their application. Laserjet-printed labels often do not offer a high enough image resolution for barcode technology. Furthermore, inkjet direct mark images smear when exposed to chemicals like solvents, and their low resolution and lack of contrast makes them difficult to scan.