Digital printing of folded instructions for use, books, leaflets, drilling schemes and their application in the home appliance/automotive industry, part 1
The box containing the customer’s dream appliance does not only consist of the target equipment for which the transaction was made. There should be a whole range of ancillary components inside to make it easier for the buyer to make first contact and take precautions, to maintain the necessary cleanliness and to assemble the appliance in the correct way at the target site. Seemingly unimportant components of the package that the customer receives can frequently solve and explain the message that appears on the screen of the device. For this reason, it is worth stocking up on high-quality materials yourself, mainly for the comfort of the end user of the product.
Printed materials – an integral part of your products. Do you know about that?
Previously I tried to familiarize you with the centuries-old screen printing technique, about which I have written two separate articles available here – part 1 and part 2. However, screen printing will not answer the needs that I mentioned in the first paragraph. As usual, I will focus on the technical aspects of digital printing in the first part of this article to familiarize you next time with how we use this technology at the Etisoft Group.
Digital printing – advantages and disadvantages of the technology
Digital printing has gained popularity, among other things, due to simplicity of use – obviously contrasting it with other printing techniques, such as the above-mentioned screen printing and offset printing. It also takes up very little space since the simplest digital printers can even be found placed in the office space of a company where they are used for printing uncomplicated internal documents. In this case, you can notice a great advantage, i.e., virtually no preparation process before printing. Obviously, in the case of more complex projects, the files must be properly prepared for printing. However, this is only a fraction of the steps needed to be taken compared to screen printing. With the elimination of the need to prepare stencils and screens, digital printing has become a perfect candidate when searching for customized prints, such as customized invitations and business cards. Summing up the above-mentioned advantages you might conclude that digital printing spreads its wings with a small number of copies, only to hand over the leadership to offset printing at large print runs.
Significant advantages also include:
- Because there is no need to prepare the tools, both the unit price and lead time are reduced.
- You can count on high quality and repeatability of copies, comparable to offset printing
- Relatively high print speed
- Flexible selection of paper weight depending on your needs
- Because of the lack of need to make stencils, it is possible to easily make changes to the project avoiding costs required for another technique.
Many of the above-mentioned advantages make digital printing an almost perfect technique. However, you should remember that there are significant limitations. In the case of standard digital printers, you do not obtain the PANTONE® palette company color, but only its interpretation in the colors used for printing, i.e., the CMYK palette.
Unfortunately, the technique is not profitable in the case of larger print runs – if you plan to print several thousand copies of one instruction for use, offset printing will be a much better solution. In spite of the need to incur production preparation costs, the unit price of a copy will be much more attractive.
- The disadvantages of digital printing include:
- In spite of high print quality, it is inferior to offset printing, which is most noticeable during full color coverage of the sheet.
- Digital printing is cost-efficient from one to several hundred copies per print run. For larger runs, the cost per print remains the same regardless of the print run.
- In spite of the flexibility in terms of weight, the format in most digital printers is limited to B3.
Selecting the right printing technique is sometimes not obvious at first glance. It is influenced by a variety of factors, which require specialized competence and experience to be identified correctly. Are you looking for a screen printing house that will successfully secure your supply chain? Our experts will prepare the right offer for you taking into account your needs. You can count on expert advice on the technical aspects of printing.
If instructions for use are attached to your products and you are searching for a company with many years of experience in their production, a vision of their usefulness and a versatile machine park,
