In the last one year, a few of Gujarat-based carton printers have strengthened their converting section by upgrading from locally made folder gluers to brand new Ambition folder gluers by Bobst. Rajkot’s Sanraj Box Manufacturer and Printers last year bought the Ambition to replace an Indian-made one. In the process Sanraj became the first carton printer in Rajkot to opt for a Bobst folder gluer.
“Customers are now looking for convertors who have quality equipment in their finishing section. In fact, a lot of times they insist on certain brand of equipment. Plus, we were also facing a lot of issue with our older folder gluer, especially for side pasting of cartons. This resulted in a lot of wastage. Taking all this into account, we decided to opt for the Bobst Ambition folder gluer,” says Rajesh Patel of Sanraj.
Sanraj supplies cartons to brand owners in food industry, hardware industry, cosmetics industry, auto parts industry and agribusiness industry. In the press department, Sanraj has two Heidelberg offset press, one 5-color press and one 2-color press. Sanraj consumes about 70-75 tons of paperboard every month and produces on an average 5 lakh cartons of various sizes every day.
With the new Bobst Ambition folder gluer Sanraj has managed to up its productivity significantly and has reduced wastage to the minimum. “Not only are we producing more cartons due to productivity increase but are also supplying those cartons on time. Earlier, with the older folder gluer, there were delays in deliveries. So, we knew this investment would help us address these pain areas,” Patel says.
Because of the Ambition folder gluer, Sanraj is now finishing a lot of lock bottom cartons, which it was unable to do earlier. “Earlier, we did not have the technology to finish lock bottom carton jobs. Now we are doing a large amount of lock bottom jobs,” Patel says. Apart from the Bobst Ambition, Sanraj has equipment like laminator and auto punching machine, among others in its finishing department.
Sanraj to set up a bigger plant
With volumes now growing and space at its 1000 square meter plant running short, Sanraj is looking for a bigger space. With the ground as well as the first floor now fully occupied, there is not enough space for any other piece of machinery at Sanraj.
“We are running short of space and will look at adding more machinery only when we are able to find a suitable place. We want a place significantly bigger that what we have at present; at least 3,000 square meter in size. There we will look to add more presses and more converting equipment,” he says.
Ambition folder gluer at Ahmedabad’s Brahma Printpack
This is Brahma’s first brand new Bobst equipment in his factory. The Ambition folder gluer at Brahma was installed in January 2018.
Like Sanraj, Brahma too was facing problems in the converting department, especially when finishing slightly complex work such as lock bottom cartons. The company services customers in the food, pharma and tobacco industries and therefore needed to convert a variety of cartons, both mono cartons and corrugated cartons.
“With the Bobst Ambition we have a much faster changeover time. Also, there has been a marked rise in productivity, which has led to significant reduction in wastages and rejections,” says Rajesh Patel of Brahma Printpack. In addition to the Ambition, Brahma has a 5-color plus coater Heidelberg press and a 2-color Heidelberg press, two Maxima die-cutting machines, and two BoxTech folder-gluers.
Venturing into food processing
The promoters of Brahma are working on setting up a food processing venture, which will produce potato flakes. The plant will be located near Gandhinagar and will process about 80 tons of potato every day. Potato supplies will come from Gujarat and the potato flakes will be supplied to snacks brands such as Balaji and Haldiram, among others.
“Food processing is a fast-growing industry, and this will be a way to diversify. The new venture will have a different name. We will start with only one line. Processing equipment will be from Netherlands,” shares Patel.
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