Silkscreen Printing for Food & FMCG

The starting point

Single-vendor production is the practical reason exporters in food and FMCG use Fotoset. Nothing is sub-contracted out for lamination or screen work, so the sheet does not travel, the schedule does not slip against another factory's queue, and one plant is accountable for the finished silkscreen printing.

In food and FMCG, silkscreen printing is used for work of this kind:

• Opaque white base printed under colour on clear polyester labels
• Metallic gold and silver panels on hang tags and cartons
• Fluorescent high-visibility panels on safety and PPE printed matter
• Scratch-resistant marking on plastic components and rigid sheets

In this sector the printed set around the product usually includes the following, and Fotoset can supply all of it on one order rather than leaving the buyer to co-ordinate three suppliers:

• Printed folding cartons for packet, sachet and bottle ranges
• Wrap-around and front-and-back labels with clear panel separation
• Sleeves and banding for multipacks
• Barcode and weight labels for retail units

Typical specifications for this pairing

Size and format range: From small labels to large-format sheets. Sheet size range confirmed against the specific screen bed at quotation. Cartons are usually 250 to 350 GSM board with a food-suitable coating; labels are semi-gloss paper or film.

Printing is by sheet-fed offset for process and spot colours, with silkscreen used where an opaque white, a metallic or a fluorescent is specified. Both processes are in the same building, so a combination job runs without moving the sheet.

• Screen preparation, mesh selection and stencil exposure in-house
• One colour per pass, with drying between passes
• Ink adhesion tested on the actual substrate before the production run

Stock and finish selection

• Art and duplex board of all weights
• Polyester, polypropylene, PVC and clear films
• Laminated and varnished surfaces where ink adhesion must be tested first
• Rigid sheets and formed plastic parts

Finishing is carried out on the same site as printing. That includes film lamination in gloss, matt and soft-touch, spot UV, foil blocking, embossing, die-cutting, creasing, punching and eyeletting, so a silkscreen printing order leaves as a finished item rather than as printed sheets.

• Overprint varnish and UV curing
• Combination work: offset base with silkscreen highlight on the same sheet
• Die-cutting and creasing after printing

Marks, references and declarations

Fotoset prints the marks and declarations supplied by the customer and does not alter them. Artwork is checked before plate-making and any mark that will not reproduce cleanly is queried in writing. For food and FMCG, the content that commonly appears on this item includes:

• FSSAI licence number and the mandatory Indian food declaration set
• Nutrition panel, ingredient list and allergen declaration
• Green and brown vegetarian and non-vegetarian marks
• Net quantity declaration in metric units, in the legal metrology format
• Best-before, batch and manufacture date fields left clear for coding

Languages

English plus Hindi is the common Indian requirement, with regional scripts added for state distribution. Export packs carry the destination market language.

Ordering pattern

• Festive and gifting ranges generate concentrated carton runs before the autumn season
• New product launches create short first runs followed by larger repeats
• Promotional overprints and flash panels arrive at short notice

Supplying files for this job

• Press-ready PDF, version 1.4 or later, with 3 mm bleed on all four sides and crop marks outside the trim.
• Native Adobe Illustrator or CorelDRAW files accepted, with fonts converted to outlines and linked images embedded.
• Images at 300 dpi at final printed size. Line art and barcode artwork supplied as vector wherever possible.
• Colour built in CMYK. Spot colours called out by Pantone reference in the file and in the purchase order.
• Die line supplied on a separate named layer, in a spot colour set to overprint, not on the artwork layer.