April Lytle on Tactile Testing, Substrate Experiments, and the Glow of Great Design
As part of Packaging Impressions’ PRINTING United Expo Intel series, we’re spotlighting the personalities and technologies shaping the future of custom-printed labels and packaging. This year’s Expo took place Oct. 22–24, 2025, in Orlando, Florida, and we’re bringing you smart, witty insights from the exhibitors driving innovation.
In this installment, April Lytle of Scodix shares how embellishment can inspire, how substrates are evolving, and how tactile packaging is helping students learn.
Q: Which trend in labels or packaging do you secretly love or love to hate?
A: I LOVE to see the experimentation with substrates in packaging. Faux leather, uncoated stocks made out of leftover jean material or straw. Paperboard companies have really come a long way with beautiful substrates that are making a punch in packaging.
Q: What’s the most unexpected label or package you’ve seen produced using your technology or materials?
A: One of our customers is using our MLE (multi-layer embellishment) to build up varnish elements on SAT testing for geometry to help visually impaired students test better using tactile shapes.
Q: Who’s the most unforgettable character you’ve encountered at a PRINTING United Expo?
A: I don't think there is a more unforgettable character than Deborah Corn. #girlsinprint
Q: If your booth had a theme song, what would it be and why?
A: "golden hour" by JVKE, because it really captures that feeling of excitement when you’re holding something beautifully designed and embellished. That glow you get when you're inspired and the wheels start revving up in your mind. Scodix seeks to be that kind of catalyst.
As editor-in-chief of Packaging Impressions — the leading publication and online content provider for the printed packaging markets — Linda Casey leverages her experience in the packaging, branding, marketing, and printing industries to deliver content that label and package printers can use to improve their businesses and operations.
Prior to her role at Packaging Impressions, Casey was editor-in-chief of BXP: Brand Experience magazine, which celebrated brand design as a strategic business competence. Her body of work includes deep explorations into a range of branding, business, packaging, and printing topics.
Casey’s other passion, communications, has landed her on the staffs of a multitude of print publications, including Package Design, Converting, Packaging Digest, Instant & Small Commercial Printer, High Volume Printing, BXP: Brand Experience magazine, and more. Casey started her career more than three decades ago as news director for WJAM, a youth-oriented music-and-news counterpart to WGCI and part of the Chicago-based station’s AM band presence.
