Domestic label market development analysis

The label can be said to be a bright spot in the printing industry in recent years. It has developed rapidly, especially adhesive labels, and has formed a complete industrial chain in China. The position of label printing in the market has gradually been valued by people. From a global perspective, North America and Europe are the regions with the most developed labels, while Asia has the fastest growth rate. Among them, China is the country with the fastest growth rate.

Now that competition is fierce, label printing companies in foreign countries are focusing on the development of new label printing technologies and capturing some new profit growth opportunities. They are considering increasing the packaging functionality of labels, including reducing the cost of labels and expanding the scale of enterprises.

The current development trend of the label market can be summarized as follows:

(1) Among various types of labels, shrink labels have grown fastest.

(2) Although paper labels are still the mainstream of labels, film labels have grown rapidly. For example, mid-to-high-end daily chemical products use film labels, mainly because the film labels have excellent water and moisture resistance, high temperature resistance, abrasion resistance, and tear resistance.

(3) Diversification of materials and forms. More and more label products have been printed by reel printing.

(4) The application of flexographic printing technology has gradually increased, and many flexographic printing presses have adopted combination printing methods to install rotary screen printing units, hot stamping or cold stamping units, and the like.

(5) Small-batch orders, rapid replacement of live jobs, and fast delivery have become the main requirements of end-users.

(6) As RFID tags have functions such as product tracking and control, they are getting more and more attention.

(7) Digital printing technology joins the ranks of label printing.

Sticker

In North America, self-adhesive labels have been widely used in food, beverage, clothing and other fields.

In the label market, sticker labels dominate. In Europe, about 45% of stickers are used. Currently used in daily chemical, medicine, supermarket logistics, electronics, tires, lubricants industry.

The development of self-adhesive labels in China is faster, with an annual growth rate of around 20%, which is much higher than the national economy's average growth rate of 7% to 9%, and much higher than the 5% to 6% in the adhesive label market in Europe and the United States. The average annual growth rate. Despite the alarming growth rate, compared with the mature sticker market in developed countries, the annual average per capita adhesive label usage in China is only 0.5 to 6.0 m2, which is more than 10 million square meters per capita per year in Europe and the United States. Dosage (in the United States per capita 17rn2 ~ 18. M2), China's self-adhesive label market has great room for growth and development potential.

In Europe and the United States, the use of flexographic printing in sticker labels is very broad, and domestic printing is still dominated by letterpress printing. The main reason is that domestic consumers are more demanding on the fine print of labels, and there are many kinds of specifications, and there are more medium and short-lived versions.

China's self-adhesive label industry has its own characteristics, that is, many small and medium-sized factories, specialized large-scale printing plants; printing equipment, many primary equipment, high-end equipment; self-adhesive label market is unbalanced, coastal areas are developed, The central region is developing and backward areas are relatively backward. According to the specific situation of our country, the self-adhesive label industry will continue to develop in many aspects in the future, that is, label printing factories with different business scopes and processing types will have their own development space.

Shrink label

The shrink label market is experiencing rapid growth and its market share continues to expand. It is expected that the annual growth rate can be maintained at between 7% and 10%, far exceeding the annual growth rate of 4% to 5% in the general label market, and the development potential is huge. The main application area of ​​shrink labels is the beverage industry. In addition, the growth momentum in the food, health care and personal care products industries is also very strong.

The adaptability of shrink labels is very strong and can be used on plastic, wood, paper, metal, glass, ceramics and other packaging containers. The commonly used film materials for shrink labels are mainly PVC, PET, PETG, OPS, OPP, etc. They have their own characteristics in terms of shrinkage characteristics, environmental protection, etc., and they must be comprehensively considered when selecting a product. For example, PET materials are environmentally friendly and play an important role in the European market where recycling is highly valued.

From the point of view of the printing process, shrink film labels are still dominated by gravure printing, and the market share of flexographic printing is relatively small. In addition, offset printing and digital printing also have a range of applications to meet the specific needs of customers.

There are four major categories of inks used for shrink label printing: solvent-based inks, water-based inks, cationic UV inks, and free radical UV'' inks. From the current application situation, solvent-based inks accounted for the largest market share, followed by aqueous inks and free radical UV inks. This is mainly due to the fact that the main customers of the shrinking label market are large companies, and their requirements are often long-lived in large quantities. For now, solvent-based gravure inks are best suited for long live printing, making solvent inks the best choice for the shrink label market. However, with the development of the shrink label market, some small customers have shown great interest in this, and the increase in small batches and short-lived editions has driven the increase in demand for water-based inks and free-radical UV inks. However, cationic UV inks are used in the shrink film field because of their high price and the troublesomeness of printing.

Shrink label printing inks need to have strong adhesion, flexibility, and considerable heat resistance, and the pigments in the ink cannot be discolored or discolored at high temperatures. In the selection, the ink mainly considers the coefficient of friction, COF, shrinkage, adhesion, chemical residue and migration and other performance indicators.

In-mold label

The structure of the in-mold label is different from the commonly-used adhesive labels. A solid adhesive is applied to the back surface of the in-mold label. The adhesive melts at a certain temperature and adheres to the surface of the container to be labeled, thus achieving the purpose of label application.

The in-mold label was first used in injection molded containers, and later developed into blow-molded containers. It is widely used in packaging of various plastic materials such as HDPE, PP, PET, and PS. In North America, in-mold labels are used primarily for blow-molded containers, while in Europe they are mostly used for injection-molded containers.

In Europe and the United States, the proportion of in-mold labels in container labels is 12% to 15%, and they are mainly used in nursing care, daily chemical, food, beverage, lubricants, and pharmaceutical industries. In China, the introduction of in-mold labels into large-scale development is a matter of recent years, but its development speed is quite alarming. Moreover, from the application perspective, the current focus is on the lubricants and daily chemical industry.

At present, the common in-mold label brands on the market include Japan YUPO, American Aere, and Beijing Honghe Weiye.

The use of in-mold labels has the following advantages:

(1) Since the container molding and labeling are completed at one time, the production process is simplified and the production efficiency is improved.

(2) The label and the container are integrated, avoiding the phenomenon of curling, wrinkling, and detachment at the time of previous labeling, and also can avoid collisions, scratches, and contamination during production and transportation so that the label always maintains a good appearance. .

(3) It can improve the product's anti-counterfeiting capabilities.

(4) The in-mold label material and the plastic container are made of the same material, and can be treated in a unified manner during recycling, which is conducive to environmental protection.

Of course, the in-mold label also has its disadvantages: the need for special molds, the need to purchase in-mold labeling robots, resulting in a higher cost of in-mold labeling; the printing process is more difficult than adhesive labels, the rejection rate is high, and if printing or Labeling problems will cause double waste of containers and labels.

In the future, in-mold label materials will be developed toward low-cost and easily recycled thin materials. In addition, in order to meet the needs of market segmentation, the variety of in-mold label materials will also tend to diversify.

RFID tags

RFID tags are developed on the basis of electronic technology. It has a huge amount of information stored, and it is flexible and non-contact reading and writing, and has a strong adaptability to the environment. According to F&S's analysis and forecast of the global RFID tag application market, by 2009, the global RFID market will increase from 2 billion U.S. dollars in 2003 to 10 billion U.S. dollars.

The field of application of RFID tags continues to expand, rapidly infiltrating into various fields. RFID tags in the logistics and warehousing, manufacturing, commercial retail, commodity anti-counterfeiting, transportation, military and other fields of national defense and other fields of experimental and practical applications are gradually starting. For example, the global retail giant Wal-Mart asked its suppliers to put RFID tags on their products.

The application of RFID tags in logistics is larger than other markets. If RFID technology can be closely linked with the electronic supply chain, it is likely to replace the bar code scanning technology. But this is not the only market. The development of emerging markets is equally important for the development of RFID tags. In the long run, some investments should be made outside the logistics field. For example, product-level RFID tags can be used for anti-counterfeiting of medical supplies, air baggage and book management, livestock breeding management, and even prisoner prison management.

China started late in this regard, RFID tag market is still in its infancy, there is a considerable gap between the application of RFID and the international. For example, the frequency of RFID tags has been basically determined in Europe, North America and some parts of Asia, but China has not yet approved it. Moreover, there are problems such as weak basic R&D strength in the domestic market, insufficient participation of enterprises in standardization, and most domestic companies taking a wait-and-see attitude.

Currently, RFID technology faces three major obstacles: standard barriers, cost barriers, and technical barriers.

(1) Standard obstacles. To apply RFlD, it is necessary to establish a unified and open technical standard, but at the same time there are multiple standards in the market at the same time, such as EPCglobal, UID, AIMglobal, ISO and other series of standard systems have been formed, and many other countries and regions are developing suitable Your own standards.

In November 2005, the "China RFID Industry Alliance Founding Conference and the Global RFID China Summit" was held in Beijing and announced that the China RFID Industry Alliance was formally established and officially launched the China RFID Standardization Working Group. As China is becoming a "manufacturing center" in the world, many products must be exported to the international market. We cannot expect the international market to support China's RFID labeling standards. Therefore, in the process of formulating China's RFID standards, it should be fully considered. Interoperability with international standards.

(2) Cost barriers. One of the key issues in promoting RFID tagging in China, Europe and the United States and Japan is to reduce the cost. At present, the price of each electronic tag is almost 45 cents or so, and the ideal price is 10 cents, which may be applied on a large scale to the entire package of goods. It is only possible to apply the price when the price drops below 3 cents. In a single package consumer goods.

Not long ago, Alien launched a 12.9 cents RFID tag. Many RFID tag experts predict that the cost of RFID tags can be reduced to 10 cents over the next five years.

The two important elements of an RFID tag are the chip and the antenna. The size of the chip involves the cost of the RFID tag. The use of conductive ink printed antennas instead of etched copper antennas and the use of lower cost paper bases is a major innovation in reducing the cost of RFID tag production. In addition, the connection of the chip and the antenna will also affect its cost.

(3) Technical obstacles. Such as RFID tags can be read rate problems, model matching issues, data processing problems.

Of course, there are other issues. For example, the impact of RFID tags on the human body and the environment, the recycling and use of RFID tags, and many consumers are worried about the use of RFID tags, personal privacy will be violated and so on.

Breakthroughs in technology and the gradual reduction in prices will certainly promote the rapid development of RFID technology and the widespread use of RFID tags. If label printing companies want to maintain their competitiveness, they must have the ability to produce RFID tags. Label printing companies must also do several key preparations: establish a good partnership with key members of the RFID industry chain; conduct technical training on RFID, and train specialized experts or engineers.