Jingle bells all year round

17 January 2011 – The festive season has come early this year for Allen Coding Systems UK following the installation of four 53Lti thermal transfer coding machines at Derbyshire-based Matthew Walker, the world’s oldest manufacturer of Christmas puddings.

As well as ‘Matthew Walker’ branded puddings, the company creates own label puddings, made to individual recipes for the major retailers in the UK and, under licence, for prestigious customers such as Duchy Originals and Harrods.

Geoff Moss, factory manager at Matthew Walker says, “We have been using Allen equipment for well over 12 years and the oldest of the original units supplied by them was replaced only two years ago, so we have definitely had our money’s worth!”

Matthew Walker currently has ten of Allen Coding’s machines fitted on its production lines, divided between 53LT thermal transfer coders and Compact 205 units. Moss explains, “As the Compact 205 models have been wearing out we have made the decision to replace them with the superior 53LT unit. We have done this in four cases to date, most recently during the summer.”

The latest 53LTis are installed on two lanes on the same lines and are being used to label Christmas puddings and sponge puddings. Operating at speeds up to 50 per minute, they apply dates and lot codes on to Matthew Walker’s product base labels.