Engraving Solutions, a leader in the production of embossing rolls for the tissue industry and part of the Tissue Business Area of the Körber AG Group, has presented the latest products in the field of embossing: innovative and highly competitive products that meet the actual needs of the market.

 

The tissue market is changing. Premiumization and Digitization trends play an increasing role in the choice of converters. Offering personalized products to the specific customer’s needs, has become one of the strengths of companies. Today the customers want to co-create with the supplier, being part of the creative and development teams from the early stage of the project for a better match of their requirements.

 

The challenge of Engraving Solutions is to provide customers with innovative solutions that answer and anticipate market changes and help them optimize their manufacturing performance. For this reason, thanks to the technological know-how in the production of embossing rollers, and keeping continuous exchanges and workshop with the customers, Engraving Solutions have expanded their offer with new digital and customized solutions that fit the new market trends and simplify the processes of development of new products. This assures the shortest time to market of a new product on the shelf.

 

There are three new embossing technologies: Smoothie, Ghost, and Ex-Press

 

Ghost – Giacomo Bianchi, Product Engineer of Engraving Solutions states – is the new generation of embossing obtained by combining, for the first time ever, two different micro-embossing techniques – chemical and mechanical – thereby bringing together the benefits of each one. This innovative technology, unique to this market, results in a product that is more pleasing to the touch compared to the traditionally embossed one. Ghost is ideal for all high-yield products with refined embossing but is at the same time resistant, bulky and featuring excellent softness, independently from the number of plies and for every product type: toilette paper, kitchen towel and away from home segments”.

 

The name Ghost evokes the special shape of the points similar to a ‘ghost sheet’. Actually, the profiles of the engravings have been softened, and therefore act with less cutting aggressiveness on the paper. This allows to reduce the strength loss that usually occurs during embossing when traditional rhomboid points are used.

 

Ex-press is a technology that allows to obtain double-colour products using embossing alone. By simply adding coloured water to the pre-embossing station, on first pass the ply is decorated with one colour, and when it is passed through the second embosser using 

 

coloured glue, the final product is featured with 2 different colours providing a stunning aesthetic effect.

 

The last novelty presented by Engraving Solutions is Smoothie, the embossing system specifically designed for entry-level products that is capable of making the paper smoother and softer to the touch. This helps improve products made using traditional or recycled and unstructured paper, featuring low weight and low quantities of long fiber paper that usually is less appealing to the consumer.

 

With a single pass, the ply is embossed on the side portions, with or without the use of glue, and calendared on the central portion. All this is obtained using a single embossing station instead of requiring a pair of rolls or a machine dedicated to the calendaring of the entire ply.

 

The final result is a roll that is smooth on most of its surface and aesthetically pleasing thanks to the application of (coloured or non-coloured) decorations. A small retribution for entry-level products that have always privileged price and convenience over aesthetics and quality.

 

At Tissue World Milan (25-27 March) Engraving Solutions will launch the new tissue configurator Touch'N'Roll. The new configurator aims to simplify the process of new product development. Through a digital platform accessible from PC or Tablet, in a few simple steps, the user can make a preview of the finished product, a real-time prototype, even before making a “pilot test”. This allows the customer to have an early view of the product, speed up the decision-making cycle and reduce time-to-market.