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This year has certainly started by giving all of us and our businesses a host of difficulties. Retailers have fallen by the wayside in increasingly difficult trading conditions, companies forced to cut costs are reducing their promotional spend and families cut back on clothing expenditure.
So, is it doom and gloom or can we bring some printed light into the marketplace?
Try using a different type ink or special effect so that you can offer your customers something different. Dry glitter bases offer the brightest sparkle prints - try mixing glitter colours for stunning "bling" effects, the limit is your imagination!
Take a look at different ink systems such as discharge, or water-based inks, experiment with special effects - combine foil, metallics, and high density inks to create current "industrial" design effects. An innovative approach which also meets key specifications such as phthalate prints free can also help you to gain a higher price from your customer and enable you to win work from competitors.
Time spent experimenting with special effects can save you money as well! Many "effect" inks can produce more than one special print - you may find that you will only need to stock half a dozen bases instead of 10 or more! Printers can draw upon ink makers' technical support teams not only to learn how to get the best out of inks systems, but also how to meet buyer specifications. Maintaining and gaining screen print business is now likely to involve additional print decisions in order to make the necessary choices of ink systems which adhere to the increasingly tough expectations of customers.
The major ink makers all have close links to key global brands and are therefore well placed to advise on conforming products, how to avoid rejections caused by contamination and to give the printer confidence to tackle the most demanding requirements.
In the dark depths of ink development departments, work is going on to constantly evolve products which meet increasingly higher expectations - whether that be the removal of formaldehyde from discharge systems or improving printability of PVC and phthalate free plastisols.
Demands are mostly driven by restricted substance listings (RSLs) which are produced by leading brands. It is often a very difficult task to meet these without losing some of the favourable attributes of inks; there have to be some compromises.
Add to this the increasing effect of REACH legislation which impacts on raw material availability, and the Ink R&D specialist is under pressure!
Contact Fujifilm Sericol Ltd on 01843 872149; www.sericol.com
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