ALTech UK and VanDerLande Industries have continued to build on their highly successful working partnership, this time in Poland having recently completed installation & commissioning of a number of inline print and apply despatch labellers as part of a state of a state-of-the-art sortation solution for Poland’s leading footwear retailer, New Gate Group (NG2), who have more than 550 retail shops.

Depending on the season 50% of full cartons are shipped directly to stores via movable telescopic conveyors into the delivery trucks of the courier services. The rest of the cartons will be sorted to four de-box stations where full cartons are emptied and pair boxes are directed to the CROSSORTER^TM inducts. At the sorter outfeeds the pair boxes are packed into shipping cartons, cartons are closed and directed to the shipping sorter. Prior to sortation, each carton is labelled automatically on the fly at a carton travel speed of 60m/min with a standard courier despatch label detailing the carton contents, shipping details and courier artwork etc in real time at up to 2,400 cartons p/h!

This remarkable throughput speed (we believe easily the fastest in the world for this type of application) is achieved via a special high pressure “direct blow” application version of our ALcode print and apply system, printing at up to 16” (400mm) per second, with industry fastest “first label” processing time courtesy the units print engine 32bit RISC processor and onboard compact flash memory, which in combination with the software excellence VanDerLande’s VISION^TM.XDOCK controls software allows the required data processing and label application cycle time to be achieved.

More information on this installation can be found on VanDerLande’s website by clicking the following link:
www.vanderlande.com/international/Distribution/References/Fashion/NG2/Pages/default.aspx

(Notes: CROSSORTER^TM and VISION^TM are trademarks of Vanderlande Industries NV)

For ALTech UK it was evolution of an already proven design, to produce their most flexible CAMPAIGN feed and labelling system yet. For Baker Taylor it was revolution taking a completely manual and highly labour intensive multiple of processes and turning it in to an automated single process - Feeding, Print & Apply Labelling and then Restacking a massive variety of different books of all thicknesses and sizes (inc hard back and soft back) at a consistent, constant rate of more than 80 books per minute for most books.

What impressed the Baker Taylor management most however was the ease in which such a revolution was implemented. With huge experience in the entertainments products sector, ALTech UK are only to well aware that whilst its solutions need to be technically impressive in terms of both the solution and the results they can produce, they also need to be simple and intuitive enough to be used by a largely “non technical” workforce that typifies the sector - which is exactly what make our new solution so impressive.

“What is true”, comments Adrian Edgeworth, one of ALTech UK’s Senior Mechanical Engineers, “is that if we can feed such a wide variety of books as reliably as this, then any CD, DVD or Game product would be easy!”

When designed specifically for CD, DVD or GAME products ALTech UK’s feed and labelling systems are proven capable of a CONTINUOUS feed of more than 120 units per minute. The system is also able to feed mixed thickness and size products in the same batch in the case of an intelligent “one to one” print and apply solution (i.e. applying a unique label to each individual product)