The company fills some of its products into containers of various sizes at its modern production facilities in the Lower Rhine region. These range from standard 1-kilogram bags for household use to 25-kilogram sacks. Each individual container is labelled with information about the type, weight and batch. The potato bagging machine sews a plastic tag with this information directly into the closure seam. ‘Our labelling is subject to special production requirements: despite the dusty environment, the print must be clearly visible and abrasion-resistant on PE tags,’ explains Heinz-Josef Hüsgen, operations manager at Kartoffel Tolls.

That is why he opted for the Markoprint X2JET plus Touch printer from Bluhm Weber Group in Rheinbreitbach. Heinz-Josef Hüsgen is impressed by the system: ‘In addition to the impressive print results, the ease of use was the decisive factor in favour of the X2JET plus Touch.’ Kartoffel Tolls currently only prints text information for product traceability, such as names, dates and batch details, on its tags. However, it is also possible to print various logos and barcodes. ‘Our customers are increasingly asking us whether we can print the logos of certain certifications or quality seals. With the X2JET plus Touch, this is no problem: we can respond individually to customer requests,’ says Hüsgen happily.

Together with HP's ink developers, Bluhm Weber Group has developed an ink that also adheres to “non-absorbent” surfaces such as plastic and dries within a very short time. At Kartoffel Tolls, the Markoprint printers can therefore print on PE films without any problems, ensuring that the print is abrasion-resistant and saving time. Until now, printing on surfaces such as plastic or metal was reserved for continuous inkjet printers that use an ink-solvent mixture.