Wide format

This GCS Strategies video features wide format experts, Sean Burke and Tom Cochrane talking to  Brian Ebenger, VP Excel Products, about the materials and installation of security film on windows and doors to protect schools.  Whether K-12 or collegiate, this film provides an additional layer of security against school shootings.  For more background on window security film, visit the GCS website blog, "Three Minutes on School Security."

Well, we are certainly living in interesting times. Two years of a global pandemic, followed by conflict in Ukraine, have resulted in labor disruptions, a choked global supply chain, and a shifting marketplace. What’s next is anyone’s guess at this point.

Interesting times certainly bring a host of challenges, but they also bring opportunity. That’s as true for the printing industry, which was living through its own interesting times even before the pandemic, as it is for individuals and society.

Wide-format printing, a large and resilient category, continues to show potential for growth and profitability. If you haven’t delved into wide format, it can be a significant new revenue stream for your print operations.

Definitions vary, but for our purposes, wide format means inkjet devices with printing widths of roughly five feet and greater. Encompassing many applications—posters, banners, pop-ups, labels, back-lit displays, textiles, home décor, wall art, and packaging—it also excels at very short runs with variable printing and customization.

There’s little doubt that printing companies are seeking opportunities to take the infrastructure, knowledge, and customer relationships they’ve cultivated over the years and apply them to new market areas. Surveys by organizations such as the Specialty Graphics and Image Association (SGIA) and Printing Industries of America (PIA) indicate such moves are key components of many print company strategic plans. A whole new industry conference, PRINTING United, has emerged to address this convergence of printing categories.

 Commercial printers are looking at packaging, sign printers are interested in textiles, and transactional printers are investigating wideformat (see the Gimbel & Associates blog Wide Format for Transactional Printers? Not as Crazy as it Sounds!).

Printers who create transactional documents rely on established workflows designed to generate millions of variable documents containing sensitive information like billing and payment amounts, purchases, insurance claim information, utility usage, or medical procedures. If that sounds like your business I can’t fault you for thinking your operation isn’t set up for low-volume wide format print applications like banners and signs.

These two print applications seem to have nothing in common. But is that really true?

Though the devices are different, printers produce wide format jobs on digital devices, just like transactional documents. Color and resolution is important in both cases, and both require strenuous quality control processes. Mistakes in each genre are expensive. In the high speed world of transactional documents, errors are

Successful customer events and open houses don’t happen by accident. To realize tangible results you will need alignment throughout your organization on event goals, event strategies, and project planning responsibilities. You’ll also need a cross-functional team to execute the plan. Everyone (yes every person in your facility) will need to know what you are planning, and your reasons for hosting a customer event. Each employee will have a role before, during, or after the function.