PaladinID » Label Printing

Markem LP 8400 Story II

Dana Ritchie — Fri, 15 May 2009 07:26:47 +0000

I apologize for not keeping this blog up to date. I thought I would have more time seeing that we are in a recession. I just wanted to give an update as to where we are at with the testing on the new inks. The testing is completed and our new inks tested better for fade resistance than the labels that were produced off of the Markem LP 8400. As a company we were estatic that after two years we finally recieved the results we were trying to achieve. The Markem LP 8400 was the only solution known to produce a colored label that could be outside for many many years. There were no flexographics inks available to compete with this old technology. We hired a chemist and put together a research team to find a solution for an outdoor colored label application. After two years of testing and trying different things, we finally hit it. We now offer a special outdoor flexographic ink that can withstand the rigors of the sun. The customer was thrilled because their Markem printer was on its last legs and the company, Markem, was not supporting this equipment anymore. I will talk more on this subject as time allows. I believe I have a product that is unique in the industry that will have many applications, stay tuned.

Thermal Transfer Outdoor Colored Labels

Dana Ritchie — Sat, 02 May 2009 13:50:01 +0000

I my 22 years of being in the bar code labeling industry, one thing that has frustrated me is that there were no solutions for outdoor colored labels that could run through a thermal transfer printer, be it a Zebra, Datamax, Sato or Intermec etc. In order to make labels, a flexographic press is used. The inks that are used do not have fade resistant properties that last more than 2-3 years outdoors. I know this niche is very small in who could benefit from a colored label that would last 10-15 years outdoors, but I wanted to see if it could be done. The key to all of this was to have a colored label that could run through a thermal transfer printer and last for many years. In my quest to source this product, I was told it does not exist from 8 of my sources. I was determined to get this product developed and then find a market. As more and more companies are competing for market share, they have to come up with new and innovative ways to showcase their products. Statistics show that color greatly improves marketability. A chemist was hired and after two long years of development and testing, we finally have an approved product. We can now offer most colors of inks on a label and is capable of running through a thermal transfer printer and stand up against the sun and elements. Where we see an untapped market is outdoor drum labeling, welding cylinders and electrical appliances such as transformers, smart meters. We will be issuing a press release for this new product in the coming months. Any questions, please call me at 603.527.0256 or email me at dritchie@PaladinID.com .

Retro Reflective Labels At 1/3 The Price

Dana Ritchie — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:24:00 +0000

I had a customer call last week and they needed 500 7.5″ x 12 retro reflective labels. There were labeling their warehouse. They had a Zebra printer and wanted to print these labels in-house. I told them about our new label printing service and told them I would quote it both ways. Believe it or not, I could pre-print their labels for about 1/3 the cost of them printing them themselves. In certain applications, our service bureau is faster, better quality and a lot less money. I had labels to them in a matter of days. They were very happy with the service. It was nice to have the right service and product for this specialty application. The customer was thrilled with the results.

New Product For Thermal Transfer Printers, Ribbon Leader Guide!

Dana Ritchie — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:21:55 +0000

After being in the industry for over 20 years, I have a new product that I am giving away. I call it the “Ribbon Leader Guide”. How many times have you had trouble threading your printer with ribbon, especially if you change ribbon before the ribbon is completely out or for some reason the ribbon breaks in the middle of a print run? It is always a challenge to get the ribbon threaded through the printer. I have come up with a rigid label tag stock with a slit that you can attach the ribbon to and feed it into the printer. Once it comes out past the print head, remove the leader, load the ribbons on the take-up spindle and print. This leader can be used over and over again and will work for any brand of printer, Zebra, Datamax, Sato, Intermec etc. For a limited time, you can get your free Ribbon Leader Guide by emailing dritchie@PaladinID.com or calling 603.527.0256. You will just loved it and say, “hey, why didn’t I think of it”.

Price Look-Up Application on Short Notice

admin — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 19:59:16 +0000

Recently, PaladinID was contacted by a retail client with a serious and time sensitive business problem. They are opening their first stores in MA and have discovered that our busy elected officials on Beacon Hill have thrown them an unanticipated curve ball. It is a law in this Commonwealth that all items in a store be individually price labeled. For those items where that is not practical, the store must provide one price look-up scanner (you have seen these at WalMart) for every 5000 feet of floor space. Basically, the scanner reads the bar code on the item and performs a search of the store’s point-of-sale data base and then displays the price. In this instance, the scanner is connected to the store’s server via an Ethernet connection.

Unfortunately, our client was made aware of this requirement about three weeks before the first store was scheduled to open. They were steered to PaladinID by our good friends at Honeywell Imaging and Mobility. Honeywell offers a product specifically designed for this application called the Image Kiosk 8560. The 8560 is a Windows based terminal with an integrated bar code scanner the uses Adaptus Imaging Technology for reading 1D and 2D bar codes.

PaladinID then reached out to our partner PSS Products for the software link between the 8560 and the client’s POS application Island Pacific’s OnePointe. PSS Products has a wealth of experience in dealing with Island Pacific software but also in implementing price look-up applications for other retail clients.

With the timely help of our distributor partner Scansource, PaladinID was able to supply the 8560 to PSS Products who were able to load and test the software and deliver the finished product to our client in about a week! If you are in the retail space and have a similar problem give us a call – because that’s what PaladinID does - solve problems!

Mobile Printers Can Now Print Permanent Labels!

Dana Ritchie — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 19:53:48 +0000

Datamax Corporation just released a new product called D-Transfer that allows mobile portable printers to use thermal transfer printing for a much more permanent label than what is currently available using direct thermal labels. All mobile printers use direct thermal label stock which have a short shelf and use life. The companies the use labels and barcodes have asked for a more permanent solution and Datamax has answered the call. This new product can be used in all mobile printers. We have stock sizes for the O’Neil printer line and custom sizes for the Zebra, Datamax and Sato lines. I am just putting together a white paper that goes into more detail. If you are looking for a permanent solution to your mobile printing needs, here is your answer. Conact us for more information.

On-Line Bar Code Verification Revisited

admin — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 14:02:05 +0000

In an earlier post we talked about an application in which our client needed to verify the print quality of bar codes as they were being printed. We recommended an after market bolt-on scanning device that could trigger a divert from the manufacturing line if a sub-standard bar code was detected.

Well, we have another client with a similar business problem – ensuring that the bar codes they print on their products are scannable by their end user customers. However, this application differs in that the labels are printed in a peel and present mode and then manually applied to the product. So, the after market Printronix device was not an appropriate solution.

We consulted with Bruce McDowell at Datamax who recommended the H class thermal transfer printer with an on-board linear scanning device option. This high performance 300 DPI printer employs a CCD scanner to monitor bar code scannability as it is being printed. The user can set a series of thresholds including bar code type, number of bar codes present or minimum number of good reads that must be met by the scanned bar code label. If the bar code does not pass, the user also has a number of remedies to choose including re-printing the label or simply stopping the printer.

While this solution does not provide true ANSI bar code verification it is about half the price of those devices and does provide simple bar code validation which is more than adequate in this and many other applications. We will piloting this device with our client in a few weeks – so, more on this solution later.

Visiting Western New York in July

admin — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 13:08:30 +0000

Last week Dana and I took the opportunity to visit with a number of our vendor partners in the Buffalo NY area. Dana was there with his family visiting Niagara Falls and I drove from Boston to join him. We met with one of our distribution partners, Bluestar who has a regional office in West Seneca NY. The local manager there is our old friend Mike Moscato.

We also got the opportunity to meet with Kathi Phelps at IIMAK, the ribbon manufacturer, who graciously took us to lunch. PaladinID and IIMAK have a relationship that goes back to when Dana started the company. We got an opportunity to tour the plant and meet the sales and marketing staff at headquarters in Amherst NY.

We also met with Jeff Bertrand at JH Bertrand in Buffalo. JH Bertrand is a manufacturer of expansion labels – they are the labels that attach to products and fold out to accommodate a lot of information. We are excited about the prospects for this new product line as it should be a good fit for a number of our existing customers.

Then it was back to the Falls for Dana so he could continue his family vacation and 7 hours of windshield time for me back to Medfield on I-90.

MassPlastics Show

admin — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 12:52:23 +0000

PaladinID exhibited at the MassPlastics show at the Royal Trade Plaza in Fitchburg MA on March 26 & 27. The show is aimed at the large number of plastic manufacturers and plastic component suppliers located in the central part of the state. Although not as numerous as they once were, the Leominster/Fitchburg corridor is home to a high concentration of businesses in this industry. The show was reasonably well attended with a steady flow of foot traffic on both days. Many of the exhibitors who were located near the PaladinID booth told us that they has been attending this show for many years and that from there many were headed to a similar show in Baltimore.

We were ably assisted by three of our reseller partners. Neal Berenson of Datalogic served booth duty with us on Wednesday and took us to dinner at a great place called the Monument Grill located, of all places, in Leominster. Thanks Neal! Ed Riley of Honeywell Imaging helped with demo gear and his affable presence on Thursday. Thanks Ed! And Jay Lauer from Opticon pitched in with some marketing funds.. Thanks Jay!

And lastly, thanks to Mike Moscato at our distribution partner Bluestar for making available a Datamax M class printer for display.

Zebra Training at Vernon Hills IL

admin — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 12:10:15 +0000

I spent two days last week being trained on the Zebra Xi and 105SL thermal transfer printer product lines. The purpose of the training was to become more familiar with these products and to be able to provide service support on them to our customers. The class was ably run by Mr. Bruce Henderson, Senior Technical Trainer for Zebra and was held at the Zebra offices in the American Hotel Register building in Vernon Hills, IL. There were a total of five attendees at the class and they represented both the end user and reseller sides of the business.

I came away from our time together with two overriding impressions. The first is that Bruce really knows his stuff. And he enjoys teaching it. The class was energetic and filled with useful information from beginning to end. The second is that Zebra really builds a great product. You really can’t appreciate that until you tear down a Z110 and put it back together again. The printer is the cumulative result of many years of design, testing and field experience. As a result, it is a very powerful and reliable thermal transfer printing device. It is easy to see why Zebra is the gold standard in this industry.