Production Inkjet Printing: Ready for Prime-Time for Commercial, Package Printers?

Creative Considerations

"You're going to start working with the creative world when working in a dynamic, full-color environment with marketing statement messaging in full-color. You'll need to give them parameters; they can't have real high TAC (total area coverage) on the page. They can't change paper stock each run. Designers who have been working on marketing brochures, etc., have to be welcomed to the world of transaction printing and educated accordingly."

Transactional color printing virgins definitely require hand-holding for the color indoctrination, Gooding says. Defining the workflow, testing papers and optimizing the environment requires a degree of hand-holding. While it won't take long to get operators up to speed once the press is up and running, setting the standards is critical.

Also, Gooding cautions, color management expertise with a Xerox iGen, for example, is not the same beast as an inkjet device. "It really is so different that it needs to be handled as its own species," she adds. "For an ongoing basis, the internal staff can definitely be trained to take it forward."

Among the primary tripping points for transactional (and other types of) printers using inkjet:

• Inexperienced color users need to understand ink/paper interaction.
• Understand the difference between other types of digital color and inkjet color.
• Pricing for inkjet. It's not just about cutting prices. Understand the value-adds that inkjet brings to the client, then price appropriately.

Similar to the transpromo space, the direct mail sector is still embarking upon an ongoing quest to better leverage data and craft content that is more relevant to the recipient of the piece, notes Marco Boer, vice president of I.T. Strategies, and conference chair of the 2014 Inkjet Summit (see sidebar on page 34). Much success is being realized in areas including retail-related accounts via customer loyalty cards and the finance industry with credit cards.