Folding Cartons Come To LOUPE Americas BY ANDY THOMAS-EMANS
verse side printing, cold foil, UV flexo (or offset) printing, coating and cast-and-cure lamination. Additional units might include silkscreen, extended driers for water-based flexo and gravure coatings, digital print bars and more. After print and decoration, the folding carton is die cut and creased in the same machine pass. Cutting Edge This can be achieved either with in-line rotary die sta- tions, one for creasing and one for thru-cutting, or with an in-line flatbed die cutting station. In-line flatbed tech- nology was demonstrated on a Canon/Edale CartonLine press at Labelexpo Europe 2025, (now LOUPE Europe) a UV flexo press configured with cold foil and cast-and- cure lamination. Semi-rotary flatbed uses the same kind of inexpensive tooling found in an offline cut-crease machine, so is ideal for shorter runs. Press speed is slower compared to fully
In-line flexo printing of folding cartons is now firmly es- tablished as part of the wider LOUPE universe, opening up new opportunities for label converters in the booming folding carton space. The key difference between in-line production and tra- ditional sheet-fed offset is that finished printed and embel- lished folding carton pieces are produced in a single pass from a roll of cartonboard. A range of print and decoration processes can be add- ed to the same press line, in exactly the same way as on a narrow web label press. In-line processes typically include web treatment, re-
rotary cut-crease, so the chosen configu- ration will depend on the kinds of work the converter is expecting. Individual die cut blanks are delivered onto a shingling conveyor with automatic waste removal, with options for fully auto- mated packing if the cartons are shipping directly to customers. Going forward, we expect to see not only flexo, but also hybrid machine plat- forms producing folding cartons in a single pass, powered by inkjet with flexo coating and other modular decoration processes. Sweet Spot vs Sheet-Fed Traditional sheet-fed folding carton pro- duction accounts for the overwhelming vol- ume in today’s global packaging market. Sheet-fed carton conversion involves multiple production steps including printing, die cut/crease and foiling /embossing. This involves a lot of work-in-progress (WIP), is labor intensive and creates additional lead time for each additional process step. Label converters moving into folding carton production using in-line presses can offer a more agile service as they are printing and finishing in a single pass. Mul- tiple decoration processes can be offered as part of the same press pass. This sug- gests how label converters can find niche markets in folding cartons. Firstly, where is the wrong place to compete? It is impossible to compete on price alone against highly efficient and au- tomated sheet-fed converters. Also, the narrow/mid-web in-line press width places limits on the format size that can economically be offered. So the niche is to be found in short CONTINUED ON PAGE 12
10 August 31, 2026
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