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Roland DG Australia Blog

Making Money with Metallic Printing

Posted on Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Metallic "MT" ink cartridgeA hot topic of 2011 was undoubtedly 'Metallic Ink' with the introduction of ECO-SOL MAX Metallic ink, the world's first eco solvent metallic ink, and the printers that followed - the XC-540MT and the VS Series. While the attraction to this solution is obvious, there has certainly been some hesitations surrounding the cost and speed of printing with metallic. No doubt for this premium solution the cost is higher, and the print speed is definitely reduced to produce such a spectacular result...

So is there a real benefit to this solution or is it not really a viable business option? Based on the sales and success of the VS Series alone, we would have to argue 'Yes it is certainly a viable business solution', but to back this up with some hard evidence, our partners in the US have conducted a comprehensive survey of their customers who have 'metallic capable' devices. Check out the article below from the Roland DGA blog to get all the facts (note: all figures relate to the US):


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We recently conducted a survey of our users who have “metallic capable” devices from our lineup, and we found some amazing nuggets I’d like to share. The survey was sent to 500+ users, with a 29% response rate, enough that the results are statistically significant.

For starters, 61% of those units are set up to run our metallic Eco Sol Max inks.

Labels & decals topped the application list, as we would have expected for two reasons. One, it takes advantage of print & cut capabilities of our devices, which our users know how to do better than anyone. Two, that decals are typically smaller and would be viewed at closer range – where you’d really be able to see the metallic effect.  I also find it interesting to see that photographic  & canvas prints made the cut, telling me that our users venture out into some profitable applications vs. traditional sign/screen core applications.

What was really amazing was that 81% of these customers charge more for these jobs (Or is it amazing that 16% don’t?Almost 50% of them charge a premium of 21% or more for every print!

Can you charge more?

Need more evidence that award-winning metallic ink (product of the year in 2009) is a moneymaker? Here’s a post from Signs101 (membership required). I like that the user hits on two key issues, pricing and how he manages the workflow. For example, print speed wasn’t an issue since he set up to operate metallic jobs overnight.

If you’re interested in learning more, we have a barrel of resources on our website:

If you’re not considering metallic printing to increase your profitability (& differentiation), then maybe you should. But I’m biased, I always see a silver lining.

Thanks for reading,
Rick

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If you have any questions or comments on metallic ink solutions, please contact Roland DG Australia.

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