iFlex Labels, the newly trademarked trade name of Fantasia Printing (Saint-Laurent, Québec), is celebrating 40 years of business success with the acquisition of a Mark Andy Performance Series P5 press. The new 13-inch, 8-colour, P5 promises to deliver many more years of success for iFlex Labels, said Mark Andy. Founded in 1976 and headed by Tony Iaizzo, President, and Lino Iaizzo, V.P. of Operations, iFlex produces pressure-sensitive labels (paper and film) and flexible packaging for the food and household products markets. According to Lino, the company was looking to enhance its competitive position by reducing waste and make-ready times, along with producing measured, high-quality work. “We compared available press offerings and concluded that the Mark Andy Performance Series best met our quality and overall performance targets,” he said. “Coming from 40 years of printing press ownership, I was impressed with the P5’s superior construction quality and performance-enhancing technologies that will help us with faster make-readies and less material waste,” added Tony.
The new press had a very successful start-up. “The first day in production we printed an order using all the print stations, including foil and lamination,” said Lino. “We saved an hour on the make-ready and the job was running saleable product in less than half an hour. We ran the order in perfect register at 450 fpm as compared to 250 fpm on our existing presses.” iFlex Labels has highly experienced press operators, so the training provided by Mark Andy focused on understanding the features of the P5 press, along with getting the operators familiar with the user interface. “Our pressmen love the new machine,” Lino added.
As a “total solutions partner,” Mark Andy is supporting its new press acquisition with consumables – such as tint sleeves, mounting tapes, shop cloths and doctor blades from Mark Andy’s Print Products Division. “Buying consumables from Mark Andy makes perfect sense to us. We expect the same quality in these products as we expect from the press. We can’t be running a race car with bicycle tires,” Lino added. “The P5 has a good mix of automation and solid technology that we believe will allow us to produce high-quality prime labels for many years to come. Just as important, it has features that will help us develop new applications going forward. Once we master the capabilities of the P5, we’ll grow our business with new products. We have lots of ideas to test with this new machine.”
