Custom Printed Film Rolls for Form Fill Seal and Flow Wrap Lines

What are printed film rolls?

Printed film rolls are the same barrier laminates we use for pouches, printed with a repeating design and supplied on a reel rather than cut and sealed into bags. The silver, gold and amber reels in our photos are examples: metallised PET for crisps, gold metallised film for a premium sweet, and a clear amber tinted PET for a honey brand.

Your machine pulls the film off the reel, folds it round a forming tube or a tray, fills the pouch and seals it. One roll becomes several thousand packs without anyone touching a bag.

If you are still filling by hand, pre-made bags remain the easier route. The full list of mylar bags and pouches shows every ready-made style we print.

Which machines run printed film?

Vertical form fill seal machines take a flat web, form it into a tube and make pillow bags or gusseted bags. Horizontal flow wrappers wrap a bar or a tray and seal at each end. Stick pack and sachet machines run narrow webs, often several lanes at once from one wide reel.

Each machine has its own needs: a web width, a maximum reel diameter, a core size, a winding direction and a sensor that reads the eye mark. Tell us the make and model and we match the reel to it.

• Vertical form fill seal for crisps, sweets, nuts and pet kibble
• Horizontal flow wrap for bars, biscuits and flapjacks
• Stick pack machines for drink powders and sugar
• Four side seal sachet machines for sauces and samples
• Pre-made pouch fillers that use a reel for the top seal strip

How do I specify a printed film roll?

A reel is defined by numbers rather than a bag size. The table below lists what we need and where to find it on your machine or in its manual. If a figure is missing, send a photo of the reel you run today and we read it from that.

Which laminate suits my product on a filling line?

Metallised PET / PE is the workhorse for snacks and sweets: good barrier, bright print and a strong seal at machine speed. PET / foil / PE adds a true aluminium layer for products that need the longest shelf life, such as ground coffee or milk powder, at the cost of a stiffer web that creases if the forming tube is too tight.

Clear PET / PE shows the product and takes a white under-print for colour. BOPP / PE is the lightest option for short shelf life snacks. Kraft laminates can be run on a reel too, though they need slower speeds and wider seals.

Food-contact, high-barrier and compostable film options are available on request and confirmed on the quote. The explainer on barrier films and laminates covers what each layer does for shelf life.

What is an eye mark and why does it matter?

An eye mark is a small printed block, usually black, on one edge of the film at every repeat. The sensor on your machine sees it and tells the film drive where to cut and seal. Without it, the design drifts up or down the pack until the logo is cut in half.

We print the mark in the position and size your sensor expects, and keep the strip beside it clear of dark ink so the sensor is not fooled. If your design has a dark background, we add a light window for the mark.

The same registration rules apply to our narrow reels for printed sachets for samples and sauces, where the repeat is short and the mark sits close to the seal.

Print, repeat and artwork on a roll

Artwork for a roll is a single pouch design repeated along the web. The repeat length must match the pouch length plus the seals your machine makes, so we draw it on a dieline built from your machine's figures. Full colour digital print suits shorter reels and several designs; plate print suits long runs of one design.

Across the web, the design wraps round the pack. The back seal on a pillow bag lands in the middle of the back panel, so keep barcodes and small text away from that strip. Our designers set this out on the free proof. The guide to artwork for printed pouches covers bleed, white ink and file formats.

How do I run a new printed reel for the first time?

A short set-up routine avoids wasting the first few metres of every reel. Run it with the machine on a slow setting until the seals look right.

1. Check the reel label against your order: width, repeat, core and winding direction.
2. Load the reel so the eye mark passes under the sensor and the print faces the way the manual says.
3. Thread the web and run a few empty packs with the seal jaws at the laminate's set temperature.
4. Check that the eye mark is being read and the cut lands on the design where the proof shows it.
5. Pull a sealed empty pack apart by hand and look for a clean, even seal with no channels.
6. Fill a short run, weigh ten packs and check the fill sits clear of the top seal.

What goes wrong with film roll orders?

The first mistake is guessing the web width from a pouch width. A pillow bag 150 mm wide needs a web of about 320 mm once the back seal and the forming overlap are added. Send the figure from your current reel, not from the finished bag.

The second is the winding direction. A reel wound the wrong way puts the design upside down or the eye mark on the wrong edge. Photograph your current reel on the machine so we can match it.

The third is a seal temperature set for the old film. A new laminate may need 10 to 20 degrees more or less. Run a few test packs rather than a full box. The same advice applies to reels for energy gel sachets and stick packs, where the seal has to hold under squeeze.

Can I get a short reel to trial before a full order?

Yes. A short trial reel of a few hundred metres lets you prove the film on your machine before committing to a long run. We print it from the same artwork and laminate as the main order, so a pass on the trial carries over.

Trial reels are quoted per order like everything else. Tell us the machine and how many packs you want to run in the trial, and we work out the metres.

How do I order printed film rolls?

Email or WhatsApp your machine make and model, the web width, repeat length, core size, maximum reel diameter and winding direction, with your artwork. Quantities are quoted per order, from £0.25 per unit of finished pack, and the written quote states the metres per reel and the number of reels.

Our designers send a free proof with the repeat and the eye mark marked up. After approval, production takes 4–6 business days and your reels travel free with tracking to any UK address in 2–3 business days.

Misprints or damage reported within 10 days with photos are reprinted or refunded. Send your figures through the contact page for technical enquiries if you would rather talk them through first.