Case Study – Marking and Coding for Microbrewers

The microbrewing industry has enjoyed steady growth in North America. The traditional brown bottle is the container of choice to best preserve the flavor of these specialty brews. Black and red inks are sometimes used but contrast on the dark brown bottles is poor. White pigmented inks can provide better contrast but a more cost effective solution is Leibinger’s yellow “Soft Pigmented Ink” that runs in the standard Leibinger printers. This ink provides good contrast on brown bottles without the higher cost and additional maintenance of fully pigmented inks.

Leibinger offers two printer choices depending on the filling environment. For applications where the printer could be heavily splashed or washed down, the Jet3pro with waterproof IP65 cabinet rating is required. If the filling area is relatively dry and the printer can be “bagged” or rolled out the filling area during wash-down, the low-cost Jet2neo with stainless steel IP54 rated cabinet is a great choice. The Jet2neo with yellow SP ink provide the perfect combination of Leibinger’s legendary reliability and low cost of operation. Numerous breweries throughout the U.S. have chosen Leibinger printers with the yellow ink. It adheres well and provides good contrast on brown, green and even clear bottle.

Microbrewers don’t always bottle daily and this can cause reliability problems for conventional inkjet printers. Conventional inkjets can be difficult to restart after being down for even a few days. “Sealtronic Technology”, Leibinger’s unique printhead design with automatic nozzle seal and interval mode assures an instant start no matter how long the printer is shut down. The result is uptime and availability not possible with conventional inkjets.