Kennesaw, Ga. – The Vestcom facility in Columbus, Ohio has taken delivery of a pair of POLAR 78 X cutters, specially engineered to handle contact label stock. According to Production Facility Manager Michael Smith, the unique bevel of the silicone coated blade, in addition to a proprietary cleaning pad designed to keep the back of the blade clean, facilitate the cutting of multiple lifts of adhesive-backed paper used to produce a variety of in-store retail shelf-edge labels. The new cutters are the first in the world to feature this type of application.
 
The new cutters replace an existing, competitive cutter equipped with a standard carbide blade that accumulated gummy, adhesive buildup and needed to be cleaned several times a day. By contrast, the new, "self-cleaning" cutters have yet to require a cleaning after a month in full production.
 
"The new cutters save us time and money, which provides savings for our customers," Smith said. "The product comes off the blade clean, not stuck together. As a result, we're much faster now, and our productivity has increased by 60 to 70 percent. We also estimate that our use of clean-cut contact paper saves approximately 15 associate hours for the retail end-user. Our customers are happy, and we're very satisfied."