We visited the PROPAK West Africa Exhibit today (Sep 22, 2016), which was held at the Landmark Events Centre in Lekki, Lagos. The exhibit is proclaimed as the “largest packaging, food processing, plastics, labelling and print exhibition in West Africa” by the organizers, Afrocet Montgomery. Afrocet Montgomery is a new partnership that specialises in running high-end exhibitions and events in West Africa. We thought it would be a great opportunity for us to source labels and packaging for the t-shirts and hats that we produce.
The exhibit was well put together and was held at a conducive location. It presented an opportunity to source machinery, to discover the latest trends, and to network, for individuals and businesses that are involved in the packaging, printing, food processing and labelling industries.
“For us, these security labels could help in effectively differentiating our products from counterfeit products. We were really excited about this vendor’s products.”
There were quite a lot of vendors at this exhibit. You can find a list of attending vendors here. They all had products that addressed different areas of packaging and labelling, including shrink-wrapping, plastic and glass labelling, security and tamper-proof labelling, and many other aspects.
“We used the exhibit as an opportunity to source products that could be utilized for our product labels and final packaging of our t-shirts and hats.”
We used the exhibit as an opportunity to source products that could be utilized for our product labels, and final packaging of our t-shirts and hats. However, we realized that the main focus of many of the vendors at the exhibit was on the areas of food and drinks. There weren’t many vendors that had products that were general enough to utilize for packaging our products.
The vendor that really stuck out to us because their products would be useful was the Shenzhen ZOLO Packaging Technology Company.
They create hi-tech security labels that could be used to avoid tampering and provide protection against product piracy. For us, this could help in effectively differentiating our products from counterfeit products. We were really excited about their products.
At the end of it all, we came away with the impression that the exhibit was well organized and executed, and it provided a great opportunity for discovery, networking, and sourcing. We also noticed that most of the vendors were foreign, mainly from China and India. Based on the present state of manufacturing in the world, this is expected. However, it really made it obvious that there are very few local makers/manufacturers of high-quality packaging and labelling products in Nigeria.
The organizers of the exhibit did a great job. We look forward to the next packaging and labelling exhibit that they will put together, and hope to see more local vendors as well as vendors that cater to non-food products.
