At the modern two-storey facility for Canadian packaging specialist Ellis Packaging, a member of the Ellis Group, a wide variety of product formats race through the 85,000sq ft plant on a daily basis destined for the food, confectionary, liquor, personal care and pharmaceutical industries.
“Our customers demand short turnaround,” says Cathie Ellis, President, who oversees the business along with her brother Dave across three facilities. “To provide that level of quality service, we’ve invested nearly $15 million in new equipment. Most recently, we added our fourth high-speed Koenig & Bauer-Iberica die-cutter at our Pickering facility. Since the installation, we’ve seen our net output, which factors in press speed, makeready times and down time, improve by an impressive 25-30%. Due to the significant improvement in our productivity, we’ve seen a major increase in the amount of savings because we’re not running the die cutters in overtime.”
The post-press department at Ellis is critical to its success. Since nearly 70% of Ellis’s operation is sheetfed production, it requires an efficient die-cutting department that is productive and reliable so that it can quickly process orders and move those jobs along into gluing in short lead times. Customer lead time requirements are continuously getting more demanding, says Ellis, and having efficient, reliable equipment in all its operating areas is critical to the firm’s success.
According to Ellis, the Optima 106 fulfils all of those requirements. Its operator friendly controls provide ease of handling and operators find the controls to be easier to understand and find all of the functions to handle the machine. “Our operators love it,” she says enthusiastically. “Makeready times have improved due to click lock and other automation.”
Investing in the Koenig & Bauer-Iberica die-cutter was an easy decision for the team at Ellis. For more than two decades Iberica die-cutters have made major contributions to their growth. Replacing an existing Iberica die-cutter presented minimal learning curve to the staff. This fourth die-cutter follows three new Koenig & Bauer-Iberica Optima 106 K 40-inch die-cutters, two for Ellis Paper Box and one for Ellis Packaging. Ellis Mississauga was the first Iberica-Koenig & Bauer installation.
Recently, Cathie Ellis was recognised for her leadership and named Printing Leader of the Year at the 14th annual Canadian Printing Awards, organised by PrintAction and its parent company Annex Business Media.
Members of Ellis Packaging and Koenig & Bauer celebrate the recent installation of the Koenig & Bauer-Iberica Optima K die-cutter.
