According to Tony Yemma, owner of LabelPrint America, “The speed of the press is one of the nicest features and one of the biggest benefits of the
Gallus ECS 340. It’s got some real advantages from an efficiency standpoint...
Tony Yemma, founder of LabelPrint America in Newburyport MA, started the company in 1990 after working nine years for a "guy who knew a guy" who had a label printing company. Prior to that, Tony cut his teeth in sales as a medical sales representative for almost a decade.
Interested in starting his own business, Tony made a trip up to Castleton Vermont following a lead on a 6.5" 4-Color Webtron that was out in a barn. The press owner couldn't do much with it except simple 1 or 2 color work. Tony brought up some process plates that they put on the press and in about 20 minutes they were running some pretty nice 4-color process labels. "The guy looked at me and said, 'Gee, if I could do that I'd be a millionaire.' To which I replied, 'It's a nice machine, I appreciate your time, and I left. I stopped about a half hour down the road and called the guy from a pay phone. I said, 'I decided to take it.' I made arrangements to bring it down to a plant in Ipswich, MA, where I first opened up the company."
Tony kept the press running for the first year by winning business over from the prior owner of the press. He developed that business and still retains some of those customers. One of those customers is now a very good size account owned by Nestle.
For most of its 25 years, LabelPrint America was inspired by, managed by, and grown by Tony's dedication to making every single customer happy. Today, Tony still works hard at sales, but leaves the day-to-day business operations to his president, Robin Hamilton, an excellent administrator who has been with the company for many years. "I have been more than lucky to have been able to hire and keep the team we have at Labelprint America. I know they are equally as responsible for our growth and success."
Tony recognizes that service is the most important aspect of his industry. "People want what they want when they want it. For instance, we still have real people answer the phone and 99% of the time on the first ring. We get them to the department that can help them so they can solve their problem or get answers as fast as possible. I don't believe in sending anyone to voicemail unless every line is lit up and it forces the phone to go there.
"The second aspect is the quality of work we do. We have set a very high standard of quality and ensure that this level is met by established policies and procedures. Most employees in the company have been here for years and years. The plant is a nice, clean facility. People always make note of that when they come in for a plant tour. They talk about how they see everybody busy, and how it appears that they take pride in the work they do, and pride in the company. We think good people deserve something extra when they go above and beyond. We have a matching 401k plan, profit sharing, company outings and other incentives besides the customary benefits.
"Overall quality was what inspired us to buy a Gallus press. We feel the Gallus press fits perfectly into our mission statement to consistently exceed quality standards throughout the industry. We felt it was probably the highest quality long lasting press out there. We knew we would produce exceptional work on this press from the first demo run."
The majority of Label Print's customers are in the consumer products industry, but they're beginning to branch out. Their primary base of business is pressure sensitive labels. The food industry is a big part of the business, plus some high-tech and medical packaging as well as personal care products. In addition to Nestle, the company is also a qualified vendor for Walmart, Honeywell, Heinz, among others.
LabelPrint installed their new Gallus ECS 340 press in late December 2013, and since then, has been put to good use printing a variety of challenging work, including unsupported film for flexible packaging. LabelPrint cross-trains employees to make sure all work is done as efficiently as possible and is one of the reasons they wanted to get the new Gallus press into the second shift. The business occupies a 22,000 sq. ft. building and employs about 30 people so they need to make every operation as efficient as they can.
"Personal face-to-face contact is important in our business because we are a custom label house. We specialize in high-end quality pressure sensitive labels. We lean toward service quality but you've got to be competitively priced in this industry. Because we do high-end 4 color process printing, I invested in a Kodak platemaking system about 5 years ago. It is one of the best in the industry.
"Kodak put us into different venues and opened different doors. Soon, I started looking at presses and deciding which way we were going to go. We added a substantial amount of revenues in the last 2 or 3 years because of our investment in the platemaking system.
It was now time to upgrade our press quality and capacities to match.
"I looked at a lot of presses. I started off with Mark Andy when they first came out with the Performance series. I looked at Nilpeter. I looked at Omet. I looked at MPS. Gallus caught my eye for a number of reasons. What I liked about the Gallus was it was upscale, sturdy and dependable. This will show my age, but I'd known of Gallus as the Cadillac of the industry, and I guess now you have to call it the Mercedes of the industry.
"I first saw it at LabelExpo in Chicago and what caught my eye was the granite base. It was just solid as a rock. Some of the other presses in the industry -- and I won't bring up names -- but they seem to be made from particle board. You put them on the floor and three years later there are nuts and bolts falling off and gears coming out of them.
"We're printing unsupported film and labels at 175 line screen, partly because of the platemaking system. Now we've taken the Gallus for the unsupported film that we were doing and moved from 175 to 225, it's amazing, it's just amazing. Everything is sharp and clear. When you're getting into the unsupported films and that type of thing, the market that you're competing in, in many instances, is rotogravure and rotary offset. When I tell people at 175 this is flexo and then I show them a 225 linescreen printed on the Gallus ECS 340, they go 'Wow.' They'd swear up and down it was a gravure piece because it's so crisp and clean.
"I enjoy the people I work with from Gallus. Andre is very, very knowledgeable in the industry. I had met several Gallus principals at shows and at TMLI a number of times before I purchased the equipment. I got to know the people and that was definitely a benefit. It helps take away some of the concerns about buying a new brand.
"I've been very pleased with ECS 340. It does the speeds we're looking for. It does the quality. Its capabilities are what we thought they would be. There were some learning curves we went through every now and then but that's the other advantage – the people are very knowledgeable. Rich comes up from Philadelphia for training or service, and he really is quite technical and very sharp. Whenever we need help or have any service issues, we've been treated very well.
"The speed of the press is one of the nicest features and one of the biggest benefits of the Gallus ECS 340. It's got some real advantages from an efficiency standpoint. We implemented Label Traxx's Estimating & Costing system and are just starting to get into material costing with it, but my gut feeling is it seems like we're using much less stock for setting up than we used to. That has to do with how fast it sets up and registers. The registration system is one of the best in the industry, if not the best.
"From a stability standpoint, the sound or noise of the press is next to nil. Even when you're die cutting at high speeds you don't have to use any ear protection. It just doesn't make noise. It cuts smooth and it cuts accurately. You don't get things moving around. It just is a wonderful, wonderful piece of machinery to watch operate. When you're laminating a polypropylene film, when you're putting a cap on, there's no sound. It's so stable and quiet, it's just amazing."
The press gives LabelPrint the ability to approach higher quality clients including those with work on unsupported shrink film. The unsupported pouches they've run at this point include a cold foil using a 225 line screen 4 color process, producing some very fine detail. The press also lets LabelPrint approach different markets they weren't in. They expect to win some of this business because they have the right size press that will do jobs at the right speeds to be cost competitive.
As for support, Gallus stocks components in Philadelphia for LabelPrint so they are available on short notice. That's good for Tony because a big part of his philosophy is supporting their customers without having to make excuses. "We don't want to be saying 'we're waiting for the die, we're waiting for an anilox roller, we're waiting for tools,' that kind of thing. Gallus really stepped up to the plate for us."
Tony points to the enclosure that houses the Gallus ECS 340. "See that room? The one with the blue stripe around it? That's the Gallus room. We separated it out, and we'll work our way back as we drop in new ones. It's a wonderful press."