A passenger at an airport check-in desk, luggage in hand
ConsumeX · for airlines and hotels

How you interact with your customer.

We design, print, hold and deliver the boarding passes, IATA baggage tags, hotel key cards and luggage tags airlines and hotel groups put in their customers’ hands — to airline specification, on our own supply chain.

Established in 2007. Nineteen years, the same ownership, customers across five continents.

Our latest: the QR luggage tag → Talk to us
19Years, same ownership, since 2007
1bn+Customer touch points delivered 
5Continents our customers operate across
You We build around your unique needs.

Airlines, airports, hotel groups, car rental networks, retailers and manufacturers.
One supplier, one standard, one supply chain.

A world first · patented · in live service

The world’s first manual tag with a digital receipt and verified digital ownership outside your systems.

Verify passenger ownership outside your data environment. No integration, no network at the counter, and nothing printed on the bag that identifies anybody.

The printed eReceipt tag: an activation stub with a QR code, guest detail fields, a space for your own brand, and a serial barcode
The tag your agent tears off. No login, no lookup, no connection.
A phone showing an activated eReceipt: the tag number, the guest details, a QR code and a share button
What the guest ends up holding, on their own device.
2 yearsIn live service on airline luggage, across millions of passengers
0Integrations, logins or network connections needed at the counter
EU + ZARegistered designs on the tag; the method patented in South Africa
25.4mBags mishandled by airlines in 2019, at over $2.5bn (SITA)

Why nobody else does this

Every other approach needs something first. A PMS or DCS integration. An app the guest installs. An account they create. A scanner at the desk and a network connection at the moment it matters. Ours needs a printed tag and the phone already in their pocket.

Which is why it works at an aircraft door on the apron, in a lobby at two in the morning, and at a festival gate. We have not found another tag anywhere that does it — everything else on the market is a consumer tag the traveller buys and registers for themselves, or a system integration you have to build.

What each side gets

  • The guest — a receipt on their own phone, several items on one receipt, and one they can share so a partner or child can collect
  • You — a record of what was checked in and when it went back, bingo sheets and group lists generated, and a message you can change live
  • Neither — any personal detail printed anywhere near the bag

How eReceipts works → The patents

Every touch point, physical and digital

Where your brand meets your customer.


YOUR BUSINESS YOUR CUSTOMER Print collateral forms, passes, tickets Tags & labels printed + digital Food packaging cups, bags, wraps Screens on the wall The phone in their hand Marketing collateral, signage, POS ONE SUPPLIER · ONE WAREHOUSE · ONE STANDARD
  • Print collateralForms, passes, tickets, receipts — the first thing they hold.
  • Tags & labelsPrinted, and carrying the code that makes them digital.
  • Food packagingCups, bags and wraps. On the counter, in their hand, out of the door.
  • ScreensOn the wall, showing something they can act on.
  • The phoneApp, QR, booking, payment — the same live content.
  • Marketing collateralSignage, notices, point of sale, wallets and print.
Six categories, one supply chain — and the printed ones carry a code that makes them digital. What each one is called in your operation is further down this page.
Why this combination is rare

A world first, digital ownership in offline environments such as lobby and hotel concierge.

Most claims of innovation are a matter of opinion. This one is a matter of registers. The eReceipt is the first tag anywhere that lets an operator allocate an item to a guest offline, outside their own data environment, with no integration — and the rights to it are granted, numbered and enforceable.

The method

Patented in South Africa

ZA 2023/03510, granted 27 September 2024, in force to 2027 and renewable. A second granted patent, ZA 2022/09555, is paid up for its full term. Copying the method here is infringement.

The tag

A registered design across the EU

Registered Community design 015042678‑0001 to ‑0004, in force to 2028. A Community design covers all 27 member states from one registration. No competitor can bring a tag of this form to the European market.

And in South Africa

Two registered designs

A2023/00702 and F2023/00701, both registered 27 March 2024. A US design patent, application 29/921,368, is pending with the issue fee paid.

And it is not theoretical

Two years in live service

Running on gate-check and left-luggage tags for a national carrier, across millions of passengers. Longer than most competitors have existed.

Now put that next to the rest of it.

  • Twenty years of specialised aviation print — the boarding pass and bag tag stock behind South Africa’s airlines, more than twenty million passengers a year
  • Our own chain from the paper mill to the counter — the only one in Southern Africa, which is what puts a token onto compliant sealed stock at volume
  • Platforms we wrote ourselves — ordering and ownership, built because a customer’s function was broken

Very few companies sit across all of that. A software company cannot assemble a paper mill. A print company cannot write a token engine. Doing both is what lets us answer a customer’s problem with whatever it actually needs, instead of whichever half we happen to sell.

Across industries

Our product capabilities, for airlines and hotels.

Every touch point above, named the way your operation names it. Pick yours.

In an airline or an airport.

From the ticket desk to the carousel — the printed things a passenger is handed, from one supplier on one supply chain.

Boarding passes

ATB and BTP stock and thermal boarding passes, to the specification airlines audit against.

Luggage tags

IATA-conformant hold tags, and manual gate-check and left-luggage tags including the patented eReceipt.

Self-service

Plug-and-play customer processing, and the consumables that feed it.

Security documents

Controlled stock with document tracing, for paper that has to be accounted for.

Catering & onboard

Packaging and consumables, delivered to your chosen catering service.

The passenger’s phone

Where the tag, the receipt and anything you want to sell them ends up.

In a hotel or a resort.

Everything a guest handles or reads between the front door and the room, carrying your brand and ordered from one catalogue.

Key card holders

The first thing a guest is handed, and the one they keep in a pocket all week.

Notepads & in-room print

Pads, compendiums, notices and the collateral in the room.

Luggage tags

Manual and left-luggage tags, including the eReceipt a guest activates on their own phone.

Registration & front office

Registration forms, door hangers and the collateral a guest handles on arrival.

Food & beverage packaging

Cups, bags and wraps across every outlet on the property.

Signage & wayfinding

Printed, and reprinted from the same place.

The guest’s phone

Bookings, requests and offers, without asking them to download anything.

Branded food packaging on a counter
Packaging

And the packaging around it.

From ovenable pizza boxes at 41,000 feet to certified 6kg paper carry bags. We combine our own local manufacturing with partnerships among the world’s largest manufacturers, so you can have a small batch made here or draw on a global supply exceeding two billion units a year.

  • Food and beverage service packaging, including cabin service in Y and J class
  • Bakery, pie and shopping bags certified to carry up to 6kg
  • Retail and hospitality packaging, bespoke or off the shelf
  • Wax paper and takeaway solutions — ISO, FSC and BRC accredited
  • Sustainable construction: water-based inks and adhesives on FSC paper

Packaging catalogue — 114 pages (PDF, 8.4MB) →

The honest version

Yes. We really do all of that.

It is an unusual amount of ground for one supplier to cover. Nineteen years of covering it, under the same ownership, is what makes it credible rather than a claim.

Need twenty million baggage tags?

Own production, IATA-conformant stock.

Need collateral across your customer network?

Local batch, or two billion units a year.

Need it held and delivered to sixty sites?

One warehouse, every site replenished.

Want those products connected to a digital experience?

The printed tag already carries the code.

Want a bespoke application built for your operation?

We write it, and we run it on our own estate.

One location, or a network of thousands?

One chain, one standard.

If it helps you interact with your customer, it’s our business.

The record

We supply some of the largest airline and hotel brands in the world.

Airlines and hotel groups do not change consumable suppliers on a good pitch. They change when the stock is right, every time, at every station, for years. Below is the shape of that work. We do not publish our customers’ names on a website — we will walk you through the whole list, with references, in a meeting.

The largest regional airlineCurrent
All preprinted passenger handling collateral, designed, manufactured and delivered to every station on the network. ATB roll-form 80gsm and 180gsm thermal fanfold boarding passes; 12″ ECI device BTP stock and full-length generic tags; LTD Release and LOFO tags carrying the patented eReceipt, fully BRS compliant; manual BTP stock; fragile, transfer, heavy and priority tagging; unaccompanied-minor lanyards, pouches and security documentation; firearm tagging. The eReceipt tag has been in live service here for two years, across millions of passengers.
Two national carriers10+ years each
Consumable support across boarding passes through to catering labelling, headrest covers, landing cards, security documentation, and co-branded promotional activations where ConsumeX handled artwork, concept and partner collaboration end to end.
An international franchise carrier
Full collateral delivered to a central warehouse, catering and food labelling and packaging, and a bespoke deployment of the ConsumeX ONE platform across its African stations for order placement, fulfilment and stock management.
A European flag-carrier group
Full-length generic BTP baggage tag stock across the region
Regional and cross-border carriers
ATB boarding pass stock, full-length generic BTP tags, BRS-compliant manual stock, fragile and labelling, across networks in South Africa, Namibia and Zambia.
Global hotel groups - including the largest in the world.
Bespoke printed guest collateral for several of the world’s largest hotel operators and South Africa’s major groups — registration forms, key card holders, door hangers, pads and in-room collateral, produced once and distributed to every property to a single standard.
Retail, car rental and the largest brands on earth
Labels, till rolls, security print with document tracing, RFID labelling, shelf-edge stock, carry bags and food packaging, and regional collateral for a global car rental network and its holding company.

Twenty years of specialised aviation print. The boarding pass and baggage tag stock used across South Africa’s airlines runs through this supply chain — more than twenty million passengers a year receive one.

“From the artwork to the quotes to the final product, an absolute pleasure to work with.”

One of the best companies to work with. Always innovative, professional, friendly, and on or ahead of time with everything. All the products are of a high quality, the pricing is always cost effective and the turnaround time is amazing.

Elke Wissiak-Button In-flight Products, Mango Airlines
Software

We write the software — and we run it.

Not bought in, not rebadged, not outsourced. The ordering platforms, the guest-facing systems and the airport tools are designed, built and maintained by ConsumeX. Hello Customer runs on AWS in Cape Town. We have delivered airport management tools, web-based procurement systems, inventory management, document handling and data analysis platforms.

Built for you

  • Bespoke applications that integrate with the systems you already run
  • Mobile-ready and web-based — nothing to install at every site
  • API-enabled, so your ERP or PMS can talk to it directly
  • Hosted, monitored and maintained by the team that wrote it

Or step into something we already run

  • No build cost and no project plan — the platform exists and is live
  • Onboard onto ConsumeX ONE or Hello Customer, both below
  • Configured to your brand, your catalogue and your locations
  • The same team supports the software and supplies the stock
Platform 01

ConsumeX ONE

The ordering platform behind our enterprise accounts.

Every location requisitions from its own bespoke catalogue. We pick, pack and distribute to wherever it is needed, so head office sees one inventory and one spend, and each site sees only what it is allowed to order. Integrates with your own system, or runs standalone.

  • Per-location catalogues and approval rules
  • Central inventory, replenished before a site runs out
  • Deployed across Africa for an airline’s station network

Open ConsumeX ONE →

Platform 02

Hello Customer

The real-time interaction layer, across the screens you already own.

Present content on the screen on the wall and the phone in their pocket at the same time, let the customer transact on it, and let them send something back — a question, a booking, a fault — which reaches the person who can act on it. It works alongside your systems, never inside them.

  • No media player and no new hardware
  • An assistant that answers from what you actually sell
  • Anything needing a person becomes a routed, closable ticket

See Hello Customer →

A wearable barcode scanner used in ground handling operations
Technology & hardware

The printers and scanners, from the same place as the stock.

As partners to Zebra Technologies and Honeywell, we supply the equipment that runs alongside the consumables it prints on. One supplier for the device and for the stock it consumes — so nothing arrives that does not fit what is already on the counter, and one person answers for both.

  • Thermal and thermal-transfer printers, and the labels and rolls that feed them
  • Handheld, wearable and fixed scanners for ground handling and retail
  • Self-service kiosks and plug-and-play customer processing
  • Specified around the operation, not around a catalogue page
Built for enterprise

Can you trust us with the whole network?

It is the question every procurement director, operations director and legal team asks before the first order. Nineteen years of continuous supply under the same ownership is the short answer. The accreditations, the chain and the people are the long one.

What we hold

  • ISO, FSC and BRC compliance, and IATA conformant stock
  • 100% minority-owned, certified by NGLCC and PLUS
  • API-enabled integration into your systems; Hello Customer runs on AWS in Cape Town
  • Offices in South Africa and the United Kingdom, supplying into Europe
  • ISO
  • FSC
  • BRC
  • IATA conformant
  • 100% minority-owned
  • NGLCC / PLUS
  • AWS, Cape Town

Why it holds

Most print suppliers stop at the paper. Most software companies have never run a print floor. Our own people have worked the front line in airports, hotels and restaurants, so we understand what a product actually does inside an operation — not just what it costs to print.

A paper-mill-to-counter supply chain, IATA and ISO compliance and the manufacturing behind them are not something a software company can assemble. That is why we can turn a printed touch point into a connected one, and keep it running.

The We Are South African programme banner
Shared value

We Are.

We build on Michael Porter and Mark Kramer’s Creating Shared Value concept — practices that grow the business while advancing the communities it operates in.

We Are is that idea in practice: an SMME development programme that uses our own consumer touch points to give small local businesses reach across the continent they could not otherwise buy. Being 100% minority-owned, we take diversity to mean everyone in an audience — not one demographic in it.

Tell us where your customer meets you.

We will come back with what we would make, how it reaches every location you operate, and what happens after it is in their hand. Every enquiry is answered within one business day.

Send us your spec Artwork, volumes and sites. You get a specification, a price and a lead time. Request the supplier pack Certificates, registration, insurance and references — sent the same working day. See the eReceipt tag The QR luggage tag in live service with FlySafair, and how it works.

Send it here and it reaches the right desk.

Every enquiry is answered within one business day. Or email sales@consumex.co.za or call +27 (0) 22 065 0261.