40 | Regulars / The Mike Fairley columnand brand protection, as well as specialized studies for individual “I could fll several pages with souvenirs from companies. the help and information Mike has given me A specialized conference, teach-in and training division was over the years. Since 1995 where I appeared formed by the now-named, Labelex/Cowise group in 1990 and was in the labels world with a revolutionizing soon organizing regular label and packaging-related conferences, as well as regular teach-ins in Amsterdam and Chicago. Labelexpo digital printing at Labelexpo, Mike was shows also were expanded from the original Europe shows in interested and was there answering, suggesting, Brussels to America (Chicago) and Asia (frstly Singapore and guiding, giving, but also asking, analyzing, then China). consolidating, reporting. Mike, you did it with Other industry-related magazines were also launched by me, but you equally did it with many people. the Group, including Package Print & Design and Product & A market can grow only when known, when Image Security, as well as starting the very frst development understood, when visible and you have been of a sophisticated Label Resource website – the beginnings of over the years this information hub collecting, a one-stop resource for anything to do with labels, from books, crunching and giving back. I learned so much reports, conference proceedings and papers, magazine articles, from Mike and so did the labels market. His a calendar of events, and links to supplier, association and converter websites.professional guidance, expertise, neutrality and Then, in 1998, the Labelex/Cowise Group was reverse-engineered kindness will be missed. A huge thank you to into a shell plc company before being relaunched as Tarsus plc. Mike for his support during these decades. I A new phase of group expansion and growth was underway.wish you a fantastic restful next chapter of your life!”Recording and documenting the industryMuch of the last 20 years or so with Tarsus involved me as a Christian Menegon, HP Indigostrategy consultant and the founder of the Label Academy, and in the writing of some nine education and training publications within the Academy series of titles, plus the world’s frst labels and brand protection encyclopedias, working with Tony White on the History of Labels book, and establishing and speaking on or chairing Masterclasses at Labelexpo shows in Europe and the USA. These events were built around the chapters and specialist contributors from some of the Academy books, such as Digital Label Printing, Shrink Sleeve Technology and Flexible Packaging. I also was provided with my own Mike Fairley column in each issue of Labels & Labeling magazine and continued to write specifc feature articles. These have continued to the present day, which I have already mentioned will be my last contribution. During these latter years, I have still undertaken some specifc consultancy projects within the industry, mainly those that particularly interested me, but also established a small historical and biographical publishing company through which I could write and publish non-industry, non-technical books, of special interest. These books, (a total of seven at the time of publishing) cover Receiving the R Stanton Avery Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009topics as diverse as the industrial revolution, World War II, Victorian music hall, and my own biography, which I have called ‘A Catalyst for Growth.’ Available from Amazon Books.“I started working with Mike in 1998 and over the following years, Mike taught Half a century has passed byme everything there was to know about Looking back over 50 years of researching, writing and talking the labels industry. It was a real honor about labels – especially during the 1980s and 90s – I can probably and also very exciting to be working with claim to have provided some level of consultancy services, market one of the key founders of the narrow web strategy, technology and market education and training, acquisition converting industry, not only in founding guidance and support, investment and development information, L&L and working with Clive Smith to specialist reports to a great many of the label industry’s leading launch Labelexpo, but also in the industry national and international labelstock suppliers, paper and plastic/synthetic substrate producers, ink and chemical manufacturers, reports Mike was writing and the conferences conventional and digital press manufacturers, ancillary suppliers, he organized which drove the strategies of and existing and start-up label converters, as well as to investment both converters and manufacturers. Mike banks, government bodies, national organizations, and to the EU. continued to be a mentor through my 20 years It is particularly interesting for me to look back over this time editing L&L and, with both of us living a few and today and see and talk with companies that have grown from a miles from each other, I am fortunate to still few million pounds, euros or dollars when I frst worked with them, beneft from Mike’s incomparable experience into multi-million global corporations. and knowledge.” It seems strange that many of the earlier pioneers and founders that I knew and worked with as a consultant or editor have retired Andy Thomas-Emans, Strategic Director, Tarsus Labels & or passed on, and that I often now have a greater knowledge of the Packaging Group history and evolution of a label-related business than the people labelsandlabeling.com