Pat McGrew from Inkish interviews the team from Jetron at Label Expo about their LB3550 single-pass label press. The machine uses LED UV technology with a 350 mm print width and can print up to seven colors, including CMYK, orange, green, violet, white, and spot varnish. It combines two types of printheads: Epson heads for CMYK to achieve very fine details and Ricoh heads for white and varnish to deliver high opacity and density. The press is designed to produce high-quality, embellished labels for markets like cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and chemicals, and customers have been impressed by its quality and capabilities. Jetron focused on making the machine easy to use, with a simplified touch interface that allows operators to quickly select and print jobs without needing advanced computer skills, which is important for short-run digital jobs. They also developed their own workflow platform called Saga. This browser-based job management system handles prepress tasks such as file checks, color conversions, and trapping automatically, reducing errors and operator intervention. This ensures operators receive ready-to-print job orders with all critical settings preconfigured, improving consistency and minimizing waste. Saga integrates seamlessly with the press and is designed to help converters adopt digital printing easily, even in emerging markets where skilled operators and prepress expertise may be limited. Jetron positions the LB3550 as a cost-effective, low-barrier entry into digital printing while maintaining build quality and functionality, aiming to make the transition to digital and inkjet technology as smooth as possible for new users.

Obviously not. This is a brilliant example of what happens when printing on Ricoh's 7XXX series where you can add white ink to your print. Print Sample TV host Pat McGrew is truly impressed with the samples delivered by our friends out of Ricoh.

At PRINTING United, the exhibitors showed more gear than earlier, which was the case for Standard Finishing. In this film, we get a great chat with the Director of Sales, Paul J. Steinke, about the market and products, and we end with a walk-through of the Docutrim to see and understand what it does.

Docus is the biggest exhibitor at this year's Sign, Print & Promotion exhibition in Helsinki, Finland. In this interview, I get the chance to talk to Jari Kunnas who is one of the owners - and besides the interesting products from Ricoh and MultiCam, I was surprised to learn how Docus is bringing Samsung displays through their resellers to market to enable both print and e-signage. Great to see when companies embrace technology and use their knowledge, skills, and network to enable continuing growth!

We love Art - and in this Print Sample TV edition, the featured print sample shows off! This is a Jazz festival poster that has been done with the utmost care for decades. DMR Graphics are producing it, and it's not a standard CMYK job, but something that requires skills out of the extraordinary - watch the sample, learn from Pat McGrew, and as always, use print samples in the promotion of your company!

Håvard Grjotheim is now CEO of Scandbook - a public company within the Scandinavian printing industry, and we got the chance to talk with him at Print Next in Stockholm earlier this year. The exciting thing about the book printing companies is that they seem to have got a renewed interest in the printed book - not only from readers but also from the publishers. See what Håvard Grjotheim thinks about this.

DJM makes inkjet print heads - meet them at www.argosinspirationdays.com in Brussels!

Mark Hunt is the Director of Strategic Alliances from Standard Finishing Solutions. Standard Finishing Solution is the American distributor of Horizon and Hunkeler, and we met him at the Think Smart Factory event in Kyoto. In this INKISH interview, Mark Hunt speaks about the transition both Hunkeler and Horizon have been in since they started working with both companies many years ago. Obviously, the market has changed, and in the interview, Mark Hunt concludes that both companies are VERY well fit for the future of digital printing. Enjoy!

LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dirk-walgenbach-37556bbb/

Interview in Dutch - subtitles in English. Hoe bescherm je de marges het best en hoe pak je een steeds competitievere markt aan? De Multipress MIS-software van Dataline Solutions klinkt – zeker in de Benelux – bekend in de oren. De huidige Print Service Providers (PSP's), printproducenten, hebben vaak zeer specifieke behoeften/eisen. Het zwart op wit kunnen aantonen van de “monetaire” meerwaarde voor een organisatie, van haar investering zeg maar, is iets waar Dataline dan ook trots op is. Dataline geeft een ​​succesgarantie af, na een speciale prestatiescan, “in bloed getekend” aldus een zelfzekere Dirk Deroo. -- EN -- How do you best protect margins and how do you tackle an increasingly competitive market? The Multipress MIS software from Dataline Solutions sounds familiar - especially in the Benelux. Today's Print Service Providers (PSPs), print producers, often have very specific needs/requirements. Being able to proof in black and white the “monetary” added value for an organization, its investment, so to speak, is something Dataline is proud of. Dataline issues a success guarantee after a special performance scan, “drawn in blood” according to a confident Dirk Deroo.

Dino Pagliarello discusses "uncommon print" and Sharp Electronics' partnerships with Color-Logic, Duplo, and Takitful. Embellishments and the touch-feely side of printing add value and capture attention.

Dimitri van Gaever took on the role of Marketing Director at Kongsberg in June. We've only just had the opportunity to discuss his new position, and it's been a good time for him to reflect on some aspects that we'll explore in this chat. Enjoy!

Entering the production floor at August Faller is a fantastic experience. The floor is utilized to its max, but the mix of technology makes the company stand out. Web-offset, digital inkjet, folding equipment, and robots enable August Faller to produce pharma leaflets to perfection. Pharma is a zero-error industry, and seeing how the flow of a production seamlessly integrates from one segment to the next is excellent. August Faller has invested in Screen technology (color and monochrome), and the choice was for August Faller to be easy as they needed the offset look and feel to move between technologies without going through tedious approval processes. They needed printers that could print on thin paper, and the more they looked into the options, the more obvious Screen's solutions ticked the boxes. The machines print roll-to-roll and hereafter get folded in a combination of Hunkeler and GUK equipment. Camera inspection and automatic rejection of anything that doesn't comply with the SLA are just a few of the things that make this amazing. With Tilmann Wild and Ralf Kutschera, you also feel very safe as these two gentlemen seem to have things very much under control - whau - this was a fantastic opportunity for INKISH to see and learn - and hopefully you will enjoy the film and learn as well!

Digital Transformation is a commonly used buzzword that many people maybe don't understand the consequences of. Though the interpretations are widely discussed, nobody questions the importance. There is a tendency that new, young and innovative companies seem to have a 'patent' on digital transformation. In this film, we talk to Head Of Digital Business Transformation / Digitalization Thomas Goecke from Koenig & Bauer, responsible for the company's digital transformation. What does it mean, what is the impact, and will it bring people closer to each other? I must admit that I am thrilled with this interview, where Thomas Goecke openly shares his thoughts and considerations.

At the INKISH NON-EVENT '22, Vice President Sandra Wagner from Koenig & Bauer shared the story about how a 205-year-old company can become a modern and agile player in a digital time. The feedback on her presentation from the audience at the NON-EVENT was really positive, not just for the content and the presentation, but also the fact that the openness Koenig & Bauer has when it comes to sharing - everything aligned with the Industry 4.0 mindset - thanks to Sandra Wagner, and enjoy the presentation that we live-streamed during the event December 1st, 2022.

This was a truly great session. Frank Woltering from ESKO took me through a software offered by ESKO called Digital Print Simulation. In ten minutes, you'll get an idea of how Digital Print Simulation can help you in not only achieving better digital print of your customer's artwork but, maybe even better, setting the terms for what tolerances your customer accepts based on what technology is available. I've seen similar software before, but Frank Woltering shows how easy it can be done using ESKO.

Scodix has been around for a while, and there is a good reason for this. In this 22nd episode of Print Sample TV with your host Pat McGrew you'll learn how Scodix is promoting their technology. As we can only encourage the best way to market anything print related is by using print. In this film, Pat McGrew show you some of the great examples Scodix has done and why both the company as well as the applications they can produce should be of interest to you! Watch, Like, and Share!

As part of our training program with reporters, Ziga Kovac and I were in Denver visiting Pat McGrew, giving her the last bulletins before heading to Hampden Press in Denver to see Nicole Jenni, Abby Noble, and Jaymes Stevenson. Hampden Press is a family-owned company, which you immediately feel when you enter the office and production on Hampden Avenue. Here, Pat McGrew, for the second time on INKISH asks the right questions, which gives you hopefully great insight into a fantastic printing company that shows that the right technology, leadership, and staff make print VERY much alive :-)

CEO and Owner Valdas Bukšnys has quite a different background from most printers we have met. Before establishing his company, Printela, in Kaunas, Lithuania, he was a double-bass player in a national orchestra touring Europe as a professional musician. Now the owner of a very successful company, Printela, is not only "conducting" a different type of "musicians" but has taken chances investing in technology nobody before him in Lithuania. Bukšnys shook hands with all his employees as we went through the production, and as we talked, I realized that Bukšnys seemed to be a personal leader leading the company with the right people, focusing and trusting his gut feelings, and less (way less) spreadsheets. A super interesting company that, since its origin, has decided to focus on 100% digital production of labels and pouches. Valdas Bukšnys believes greatly in the future, and we wouldn't be surprised if he reaches his objective of being twice the size in a few years' time - as planned. The equipment Printela use is fra HP, GM, Karlville, and Cartes, workhorses in the label/flexible industry! Enjoy the film! LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/valdas-buksnys-077aba4a/

LamiFaktur is a quite unusual Scodix customer, but this is the story about the small sub-contractor LamiFaktur from Münster in Germany, who decided to step up from delivering only laminations also to offer digital enhancement options. Norbert Altevolmer and Yannick Altevolmer manage the family-owned company. Despite investing in the Scodix machines just months before the pandemic started, they can already see success and new opportunities for the company. Learn and enjoy!

In this special live episode of Taktiful Tuesdays, we're coming straight from the Xerox Partner Summit in Las Vegas. I sat down with my longtime friend and Xerox legend Kelly Leahy—Senior Global Product Marketing Manager—to talk about everything from digital embellishment trends and the Genesis Initiative to the psychology of print, AI in design, and how print service providers can better educate their customers. We also dive into career growth, continuous learning, baseball tournaments, and dogs. If you're curious about where the print industry is headed, how digital embellishments can boost engagement, or just want to hear two print geeks talk shop (and dogs), you’re in the right place.

In this interview, Global Director - Digital Embellishment Solutions, Michael Aumann, explains the three types of digital embellishment technologies that today exist and how these are used based on application. We also talk about sustainability and many more interesting things - but dig in, we are certain you will like this! Kurz has built a super nice booth at LabelExpo, where they show both technology and applications. In the interview, we learn more about whether metalization is sustainable and how Kurz addresses sustainability both in the production and in the finished products. We also get a chance to learn about the technologies Kurz supplies and, therefore, better understand when to use which technology. It was super nice meeting Michael Aumann again, who recently stepped into a global marketing role. It's worth listening to! LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-aumann-ab5833/

A year ago - on February 14th, 2023, the HP PageWide C550 was launched, and just a few months later, the first installation in North America was a reality with Sutherland Packaging in Andover. In this INKISH episode, you learn about the considerations and the result of the investment - and from the perspective of being a family-owned company that until this investment primarily focused on brown boxes, this step is major. Sutherland sees entirely new opportunities and an opportunity to convert brown-box customers into multi-colored boxes. However, the C550 is also used to produce Point-of-Sales displays, a lucrative business for Sutherland - but listen and see. Super nice people and super nice company - it was fun being there - thank you, Jake and Manny!

Trends and changes in ways of producing print can also be spotted by looking and talking to the suppliers of solutions processing them, like (photo) book printing. The changeover from offset technology to the benefit of Inkjet and digital printing techniques is a fact, according to Jens Krüger from Digibook technology. Let’s meet this Swiss company supplying keen solutions for hard- & softcover products. Digital production seems the way to go, and with not many players in the medium range, Digibook feels they make a strong case. We find out together.