The rapid growth of digitalization has boosted the fashion industry, resulting fast fashion especially among Gen Z. Among the “want it now” Gen Z generation, they are the most influenced generation to buy an item trending when they’ve seen that fashion items on social media either in physical or online fashion store. This trend has consequently in a significant consumption of labels and consumable, such as Thermal Transfer Ribbon. Thermal Transfer Technology play a crucial role in supporting traceability, giving confidence for seamless tracking from manufacturing of the textile products to the point-of-sales.
This global giant supplier of fashion and lifestyle brands have more than 10,000 selling points with a strong geographical presence in more than 29 countries worldwide. Today, they provide fashion options centered on delivering excellent value for money and affordable luxury items, all made possible by their streamlined and budget-conscious global supply chain management.
The challenge
They are looking for a replacement of their current Thermal Transfer solution due to the issues listed below:
- Current Thermal Transfer ribbon no longer able to withstand industrial washing processes.
- Blackness
- Inconsistency quality of the ribbon – Blockage
The substandard quality-to-value ratio and the performance of the current ribbon in their production line have resulted the loss of printed information on the label. This situation has costed multiple losses due to the shut down time of the 12 production lines.
They listed out their requests to our local partner based in China to lend a helping hand.
- High speed printing for clothing tag, packaging, and carton box labels.
- Consistent quality of the ribbon
- High durability, able to remain dark, crisp, and sharp information on Satin care label.
- Able to withstand high heat – heat can cause fading of printed information.
- The print needs to resist from industrial washing procedure and maintain legibility.
- More competitive price based on their consumption.
- Respect several stringent textiles regulation – OEKO-TEX® certified.
- Local Technical support
The solution
Considering the high speed of the production line and complexity of managing thousands of their products, packaging, parcels, and the supply chain every single day, implementing a reliable traceability system is a must for their extensive of business operations across countries. Our Thermal Transfer ribbon technology ensures supply chain management excellency at a vast scale.
To solve and improve its production line, our local partner and ARMOR-IIMAK China team have suggested our newly release Textile Resin Thermal Transfer solution ATX 7 for their satin care label application and APR 600 for their high-speed printing of clothing tag, packaging labels and logistics labeling needs. The combination of ATX 7 and APR 600 provided an one-stop Thermal Transfer solution for their various labelling needs.
Why ATX 7 is the perfect match for their care label application?
Through several on-site printing tests done together with our local partner at end-user factories, they found that ATX 7 offered the best in terms of print quality, consistency, durability and globally certified and recognised for this specific application to fulfill the request of best quality-to-value and stringent textiles regulation.
- ATX 7 demonstrates high heat resistance, exhibiting no signs of information fade even after undergoing 50 rounds of industrial washing test.
- With the unique characteristics of ATX 7, razor-sharp printing quality of information printed on the satin care label with excellent readability after several intensive tests.
Ribbon A Print Quality
On Satin
APR 600, Near Edge Thermal Transfer solution for high-speed printing
- The 2D barcode and information printed on the clothing tag and packaging using APR 600 display excellent blackness (2.2 ODR) and print quality even with high printing speed (25ips, 600mm/s) in the production line.
- Good resistance to scratches and smudges resistance for carton box application. Mainly contributing to the traceability within their supply chain.
Why ARMOR-IIMAK and our partner?
In addition to addressing challenges and meeting requirements, ARMOR-IIMAK China and our partner highlighted the following:
- Technical support team in China and our local partner provided on-site printing tests, allowing end-user to have a side-by-side comparison between ATX 7 and their current Thermal Transfer ribbon.
- Our commitment to competitive pricing not only stands out in the consistency of the product quality but also delivers exceptional quality-to-value of the ribbon.
- Certifications are available for each of our product to meet stringent regulations.
Through the collaboration of the ARMOR-IIMAK team and a local partner in China, there was complete confidence in inkanto’s ability and performance to deliver an optimal Thermal Transfer solution, spanning from production to point-of-sales for the end-user. It not only met the challenging requirements of the end-user but also exceeded their expectations in terms of premium services, immediate on-site printing tests, and rapid response times. This success resulted in a recurring order, totaling 1.1 million sqm for ATX 7 and 2.25 million sqm for APR 600.
