How often can you say a technology from the 1960s remains competitive in nearly the same form today? One technology is liquid photopolymer for direct print corrugated applications in flexography. Over the past 50+ years, we have witnessed the introduction of digital platemaking and the continued evolution of water wash technology for sheet photopolymers. Each of these areas competes with liquid platemaking yet, despite these competitive pressures, liquid technology remains alive and well. While liquid continues to evolve through imaging innovations and enhanced processing equipment, it maintains its fundamental characteristics as well as its ecological and economic strengths. Along with the digital revolution, and the equally demanding sustainable revolution returned focus to liquid's unique capabilities. Working for MacDermid Graphics Solutions, I have the unique vantage point of innovating in multiple plate technologies such as analog and digital platemaking, as well as solvent...

Preface As we navigate these times during the COVID-19 pandemic, MacDermid Graphics Solutions is proud of our global team for following local health safety guidelines while continuing to support our company and customers. Ivan Rozo, Business Development Manager, MGS Latin America, wrote this blog to reflect on the changes and challenges that we are all experiencing in the packaging supply chain. With this article, Ivan wants to thank our LATAM team; he and the rest of MacDermid stand behind them as they work to stay on top of the current situation.   Image 1. Planning and Solutions To start, we must travel back in time to the fall of 2019...businesses were budgeting and organizing sales plans for 2020. Having a string of continuous growth, it seemed logical to project a new year with bigger goals and more significant challenges. For MacDermid, the differentiation in our value equation always seeks to provide operational advantages that allow us to solve busin...

To a consumer, product packaging may be a secondary consideration to the product inside the package. Companies devote countless hours designing a product, making sure it offers the absolute best value and experience to the customer. But let's take a second and think about the last time you bought a product from Apple, an iPhone, iPad, or Macbook, and you weren't impressed with the way it was presented in the packaging? Opening the box of a new iPhone is an experience in and of itself! Smart product companies know their packaging is more than a corrugated box, plastic bag, or folding carton. Product packaging is a powerful tool used to amplify a brand and build a connection with the consumer. Your packaging possesses a unique asset: it provides you with an opportunity to give your customers a guaranteed sensory experience, both sight, touch, and sometimes even smell. At the grocery store, a consumer can pass, on average, over 39,000 items while shopping. How does...

Flexographic printing is continuously evolving, and the platemaking process is seeing this exponentially. Platemaking is evolving not only in the development of new and innovative materials but also in the technological improvements of imaging and processing equipment. Together these make a more efficient and consistent workflow to deliver high-quality plate that can consistently reproduce the information of a digital file in its finished structure. All of us have been familiarizing ourselves with terms such as high definition, high resolution, surface screening pattern, and flat-top dot, among others. The reality is that ALL suppliers in this field have achieved a synergy, bringing about a complete revolution making the flexo printing process more competitive compared to other technologies such as rotogravure and offset. However, in an environment that tends to become more automated, there are still uncertainties in the manufacture of the plates and even returns of the finished prod...