A PRINT Extravaganza

The PRINT 13 trade show emphasizes the trend toward the Great Diversification Movement. The printing industry is enduring some violent changes from a technology standpoint. With the decade-long trend toward shorter runs continuing, digital printing—especially inkjet—stepping up its game, and electronic alternatives continuing to harvest market share, diversification is on the lips of many printers as they prepare to trek to Chicago for the quadrennial Fall classic.

This show continues to take a page from today's printers by offering a program high on diversity and light on heavy iron. Gone are the days where an exhibit next to an offset press manufacturer's booth meant bringing a bottle of aspirin; the loud clatter of the 40˝ sheetfed beasts won't be piercing the air. (Heidelberg won't even be at the show!)

Also gone is the time when booths were the size of a junior college campus. In fact, the show is confined to a smaller footprint these days, notes Ralph Nappi, president of the Graphic Arts Show Co. (GASC), which runs PRINT and its sister exhibition, Graph Expo.

"The days of taking huge booths, just to appear big, are long gone," he says. "That's not just in the United States. At China Print, it was obvious that booths of noteworthy size were not to be found."

What the show will have is a greater variety in the printing garden. For example, the Converting & Package Printing Expo (CPP) will be the first co-located show in PRINT/Graph Expo history. Admission to CPP is inclused with PRINT 13 registration.

New This Year

Among the other changes to look for:

• Two new pavilions have been added. The Photo Finish is dedicated to photo imaging and the popularity of photo books, wide-format imaging and related services. Sidelines, the expanded revenue streams pavilion, is aimed toward new money-making sources from a variety of specialty printing.

• The mailing and fulfillment pavilion, Deliver, has been renewed and "re-imagined." The U.S. Postal Service and the Association for Marketing Service Providers (AMSP) were both instrumental in giving the pavilion a makeover.

• The educational platform shifted its focus, taking a "how to" approach for implementation and execution of products and services for its 70-plus sessions. There will also be "ask the experts" stations on the floor and in the theaters geared toward enabling printers to actuate new and ancillary capabilities.

• Seven of those sessions, not to mention two lunch-time events, will be devoted to in-plants. (If you missed it, go back to page 6 for our story on all the in-plant activities happening at PRINT 13.)

• Co-located events continue to billow inside the McCormick Place confines. Four years ago, GASC logged 22 events; this year it's up to 64. Nappi feels it not only validates PRINT/Graph Expo as the central industry event; it is truly wide-ranging, covering the full gamut of today's marketing service providers while offering a little something for neighboring professions (newspapers, designers, creative professionals).

Nappi feels the increase in attendance is largely due to the success of the co-located events, and he anticipates the upward tick to continue this year.

The Must See 'ems

The Executive Outlook annual show kickoff will once again be preceded by a Webinar preview of the Must See 'ems product and technology awards. A Best in Category winner will be selected from the Must See 'ems pool.

A Legacy Award will be given for a technology that is at least 10 years old and a former Must See 'ems winner, and the Positively Print honor will be bestowed upon the entity that most effectively promotes the "power of print" message through its organization's campaign. Executive Outlook takes place Sept. 7.

So what can we expect to see at PRINT 13 in Chicago? Jim Hamilton, production group director for Info­Trends, will provide a presentation at Executive Outlook on a topic that has been of particular interest, not just in the printing industry, but the technology sector as well: 3D printing.

"It's an interesting topic, but except for Afinia—which has 3D offerings and will be showing a label printer—there will be few, if any, 3D printers on the show floor," he notes.

"I'm also looking forward to seeing the B2-format digital printing products," he adds. "The HP Indigo 10000 has been on the market for some time now, and we should see some other examples, including Konica Minolta's KM-1, which was shown as a technology demonstration at drupa 2012. It's a bit too early for Landa, but they did announce at China Print that they will be going into beta testing with a B1-format unit early next year."

"The high-speed continuous feed inkjet market continues to grow, and though I'm not expecting any big new product announcements, there will be plenty to see, including an Océ ColorStream 3900 in the Canon Solutions America booth. Another interesting area is the use of UV inkjet for coating, dimensional and other applications. MGI has expanded its offerings with the JETvarnish 3D and Scodix showed some great print samples at China Print and PrintPack India, so I'm looking forward to seeing what they bring."

A More Intimate Experience

Marco Boer, vice president of I.T. Strategies, believes that the smaller footprint and lack of monster-sized machinery will make for a more intimate experience, and thinks attendees will benefit from vendors putting on more application demonstrations.

As for technology, Boer feels digital inkjet will continue its dominating presence at the show. Breakthroughs in ink chemistry technology will also help to open some doors for printers, he notes.

"Being able to print on new substrates is critical, particularly for something like wide-format graphics. It allows for new applications," Boer says. "If I can print something on a stretchable piece of film or vinyl and wrap it around a car, the printing is going to cost $500, but to wrap it will cost the customer $2,000. So, you have all these auxiliary services being enabled by the development of new ink chemistries. That's a significant enhancement."

Getting in on the ground floor of a printing technology can enable companies to reap greater margins while navigating the learning curve, Boer stresses. That's one of the primary value propositions of the PRINT/Graph Expo experience.

"Because you're able to get a better profit margin, you're able to make more mistakes while you're coming up that learning curve," Boer says. "That's something we all underestimate. Sure, you can wait to buy the next generation of product but, the longer you wait—and, yes, the machine might not be as expensive in 12 months—the more you're going to miss out on moving up that learning curve."

Finishing Flexibility

Trish Witkowski, the chief folding fanatic at Foldfactory.com, is eagerly awaiting the PRINT show. She notes that print finishing machinery is becoming increasingly modular, flexible and functional.

"Flexibility has really been an overall theme in print finishing over the past few years, as manufacturers are looking for ways to offer more than, say, just a folding machine, or just a saddle stitcher," Witkowski notes. "As printers entertain the idea of replacing often decades-old bindery equipment that may still be working just fine, thank you, manufacturers are loading up their machines with features that enhance the versatility and value of the investment. It gets better and better.

"In the digital print finishing arena, the bar raises every year," she continues. "We're seeing special print techniques and substrates, higher speeds, multiple finishing processes in a single pass, and—near and dear to me—the automation of creative formats for mail and marketing. It's fabulous to see greater economy in engaging print formats. Mail can be so much more than tri-folds and postcards these days, and I delight in seeing the manufacturers reflect this in their offerings."