Flexo printing market

In the past ten years, flexo printing has developed more and more in the world, and its printing technology has also become more mature and its use has become more and more extensive. Not only in the packaging industry, but also in the publishing and printing also occupies an increasing proportion. In China and Canada, flexo printing has developed rapidly in recent years. It is expected that flexo will have a leap forward in the 21st century.
Flexo printing gravure, offset printing has many advantages. Compared with gravure printing, it has a short plate making cycle, high overprinting precision, low price, no pollution, no toxicity, a wide flexo range, and is suitable for middle and small batch printing. Relative to offset printing, it has high printing resistance, fast printing speed, no pollution, and large print volume. It is suitable for large-volume activities, film lamination, connection bronzing, and concave-convex die-cutting. The comparison of the three printing methods is shown in Table 1.
At present, the flexo printing market can be roughly divided into three markets: (1) corrugated paper printing market; (2) narrow-width printing market; and (3) plastic film printing market.
1. The corrugated paper printing market flexographic technology has an absolute advantage in the corrugated printing industry. The quality of the printed carton is much better than that of conventional offset and hand offset carton printing. To print high-end cartons, it is best to use flexographic printing. Only on a nationwide scale, flexo presses are still relatively small, and flexographic prices are relatively expensive, and they cannot be widely accepted within a short time. With the development of the economy, the enhancement of people’s economic ability and aesthetic sense, the improvement of the quality of packaging, and the extension of the economy from the coastal to the inland, the market with the greatest potential will be gradually revealed.
2. The narrow-width printing market The narrow-width market refers to the cigarette, alcohol and cosmetics packaging printing industry. Its printing machines are all narrow-width printing presses. It is called the narrow-width printing market. At present, there are more than 130 narrow-format presses in the country, which have soared from dozens of them in 1995 to more than 100 in 1998. The rapid development of the narrow-web printing market is surprising. In the field of narrow-width printing, flexo printing mainly competes with offset printing for the market, such as cigarettes, wine boxes and so on. Simple level and complex line products are best suited for flexographic printing. Offset printing is more suitable for small-volume printing products, while flexographic printing has the advantages of long printing plate life and fast printing speed. With the drop in the price of flexo, flexo may share the world with offset.
3. The price of wide-format flexo printing machines for plastic film printing is relatively high. Now, there are only a few domestic manufacturers that use flexo printing machines to print plastic films, such as Dalian Dalian, Shanghai Ziquan, Tiger, and Hainan Yongguang. Its printing products include instrument packaging cosmetics, sanitary products, and other plastic packaging, which mainly compete with the gravure printing market. At present, plastic packaging is mainly gravure printing, because gravure printing is suitable for high-volume, complex-level printing products. In this regard, soft gravure printing is more difficult to compete in the market, but flexo printing is suitable for medium-to-low-grade printing products. The characteristics of short production cycle will be able to compete with Intaglio. Since flexo printing is pollution-free and pollution-free, along with the economic development, people's awareness of environmental protection has increased, and flexo printing has made people more and more widely used.
Although flexographic has many advantages, it is still facing the following problems because it is in the development period:
(1) Flexo printing follows the steps of gravure printing and offset printing and is a product that simulates offset printing and gravure printing;
(2) Flexographic printing costs are still high;
(3) People do not have enough knowledge of environmental protection.
In developed countries such as Europe and the United States, the reason why flexo printing can rapidly develop and occupy the major markets of the printing industry is because developed countries pay great attention to environmental protection and the quality of product packaging. The appearance of the product is mainly the packaging with simple and clear colors, complicated lines and strong visual impact. Chinese people like the rich, colorful packaging, which is undoubtedly an obstacle to the development of the flexo market. In addition, there is a disconnect between Chinese packaging designers and printers. They do not understand the printing process and have different characteristics of flexographic printing. Therefore, the designed samples are generally not suitable for flexographic printing. To enable the healthy development of flexo printing, it is necessary to start from the packaging design and design a design draft that meets both Chinese traditional concepts and flexographic printing features, so that the advantages of flexo printing can be fully realized.
At present, the cost of both flexographic printing and plate making cannot be reduced, mainly because printing equipment, plate making equipment, and plate making raw materials are imported from foreign countries. If flexographic printing is to be popularized in China, costs must be reduced.
Flexo printing is a simple and efficient printing technology. It is a normal way for flexo printing to develop a flexographic printing system in response to the current situation of flexographic printing in China, update concepts, improve printing technology, and reduce costs. Flexo printing can also be combined with other printing methods (such as flexo printing and holographic, foil stamping and other anti-counterfeiting methods) to improve product quality and make full use of its features.