Most ribbon problems are not ribbon problems. They are a mismatch between the ink, the surface it lands on, and what the label has to survive afterwards.
Wax ribbons print at low energy, run fast and cost the least. They bond to uncoated and coated paper and produce a solid black at 203 dpi. They also smear with a fingernail and fade under UV, which is fine for a carton label and not fine for an asset tag.
A wax-resin blend prints on both paper and film, resists moderate abrasion and holds up to some solvents. It is the default when a customer has mixed substrates and does not want to stock two ribbons. It is not the best at anything.
Resin ribbons need more energy and slower speeds, and they bond to PET, PP and synthetic paper where wax will not anchor at all. They resist alcohol, abrasion and heat. On a film label that goes onto a chemical drum, this is the only correct choice.
Print a sample, then rub it with a thumb, then with an alcohol wipe, then scratch it with a coin. Where it fails tells you which ribbon class you need. We send ribbon swatches with every film sample so the test can be run on your own printer.
Face stock, printer model, print speed and the environment the label lives in. Those four answer the ribbon question without a trial-and-error cycle.