The Spanish Giro range of bagging and labeling is the new product that local firm Al Thika Packaging LLC will showcase at Gulf Pack 2004 in Dubai.

The company, which has booked 90 sq m of space at the front and centre of the Airport Expo fairground site, will also put on display its other products such as Markem environmentally friendly coding technologies including the Smartdate on-line thermal transfer printers and Smartlase laser coders. Also on view will be shrink and stretch wrapping equipment and supplies including the Robopac range of pallet stretch wrappers.
“Fruit and vegetable packing has lagged behind other FMCG products in the Gulf when it comes to presentation,” said Al Thika managing director Ian Barker when discussing the Giro range. “Customers and retailers prefer pre-packed produce, rather than the hassle of selection and weighing and pricing in the supermarket. With Giro, we can offer a highly cost-effective packing solution using woven mesh bags which allow the products to breathe but also enable the customers to see them.”
Giro equipment covers a wide range of the requirements, from small retail outlets up to dedicated packing houses, with the possibility of integrating automatic weighing and price labeling and bar-coding on the finished pack.
“Customers special needs and the varying demands of their local markets require flexibility. Giro offers nets in a wide spectrum of colours and distinctive patterns to ensure the right product is available to enhance the presentation of the fruit or vegetables being packed,” a Giro text said.
Giro’s Girplus system forms and welds film bands and tubular net automatically to produce a bag with a carrying handle and either single or double internal film bands that can carry printed information or a sales message.
Its Girsac system offers greater impact, incorporating external header bands running from top to bottom of the pack and providing maximum strength for carrying and a large area for logos, promotional messages and general product information.
Al Thika has participated in the packaging event every year since it started life as Packtech. Each year has seen the extent of its participation increase.
“The 2002 show saw us launch the Markem product range,” said Ian. “With the experience that Tim Ansell (sales director) and myself have in the coding and marking field, it was natural that we should get back into this market. We had contacted Markem in 2001 just as they were looking to upgrade their representation in the Middle East, and they are now one of our most important suppliers.”
For printing onto flexible films Markem’s Smartdate offers many advantages over ink-jet and hot foil coding, said Ian. “The Smartdate range is fully programmable to print any data you could require - barcodes, graphics, automatically changing dates and times, and multiple languages. Once customers have seen it in action they are convinced - no mess, no smell, no brass types to replace and no start-up delay.”
Smartlase provides a clean alternative to ink-jet for many other coding applications, and has the major benefit of zero running costs. Smartlase has no consumables, no mess and - with a three-year guarantee - no competition.”
Touching on Al Thika’s traditional market for shrink and stretch wrapping equipment and supplies, Ian said Robopac’s extensive range of pallet stretch wrappers would be showcased with a separate demonstration area for their unique self-propelled ‘Robot’ pallet wrapper. It had proved popular with customers wrapping oversized loads or where shortage of space made a fixed turntable installation impractical. In addition, their best-selling Smipack L-sealers, tunnels and hood-type shrink wrappers would be seen in action.
The efforts that organisers Fairs and Exhibitions had put into re-branding the show and attracting overseas and multinational exhibitors had increased its international stature and would pay huge dividends both for exhibitors and visitors, commented Ian.