There has been many articles written expounding the virtues of digital garment printing over the years. Most just discuss why it’s a good thing, or compare it to traditional screen-printing. Not many articles are available discussing exactly what problems a DTG printer can solve though.
So, let’s address why using a digital printer could solve that tricky problem for you, and if you use Visual Impressions, make you more money with that order.
Tight Turn-times
Regardless of how many colors your image uses, using a digital printer to push that order out might be just the trick for those crazy rush ideas your client throws your way. With traditional screen-printing, there is a production delay as the art has to be approved, and then the screens burned, washed out, dried and made ready to register on press.
With digital, we can handle the art and get the shirts printing with a push of a button. When your client says “I need these shirts ASAP”, and you are scrambling to figure out how to get it handled…this is the perfect answer.
Photos on a T-shirt
Your client really wants to get that head shot enlarged and printed on a lime green t-shirt. With any type of screen-printing you are faced with using halftones to replicate the image. Halftones have that inherent quality problem though in that they are composed of a series of dots, and sometimes these don’t look so hot on a t-shirt when printed.
To make matters worse, occasionally other, less quality-minded printers that don’t use computer direct to screen imaging systems can get a moiré pattern introduced, and that just never looks right.
Digital prints always make photographs look fantastic because they don’t use halftones as part of the printing process. If you want to wow that customer, use digital printing instead of screening. You won’t regret it.
Trade Show Product Shot
Your client is introducing that new gizmo at the next trade show and needs some t-shirts to give away. How are you going to make that gizmo look fantastic on a t-shirt? Digital of course. Remember, there’s no halftones, so you can get a magazine quality photograph on the shirt.
Imagine the high-fives you’ll get when you pull that one off.
High Color Count, Low Order Volume
Fifteen color job for 24 shirts? Sounds like a perfect DTG order. Why? Well, start counting screens and throw in those screen charges and it’s easy to see that either that art has to be drastically changed, the client disappointed, or someone is eating some of the cost.
That doesn’t have to happen…just print it digitally as there’s an unlimited color count as everything is printed CMYK. Need one more shirt the following Tuesday because someone forgot to register for the event?
No problem. We can whip one more out in no time, as the art is already saved on our printer server.
Managing Inventory for a Catalog Program
Don’t want to preprint a bunch of shirts and have to sit on that money? Why not just do them digitally as needed and have them drop shipped to the end user? Talk to us about what you need to help your customers, we can assist you in building a seamless program.
So How Does Digital Printing Work at Visual Impressions?
Simple. Just like any other order, you would send us the art and Purchase Order for the job. We’re on the PSST network with SanMar, alphabroder, and S&S so you can drop ship us the inventory for free. We’ll put the order in and schedule the work. The goods will be received and we’ll print your order and ship. You’ll get an shipping tracking number automatically sent to you.
If you need help with art, pricing or just simply understanding this stuff we’re here for you. Our job is to make you a success in the eyes of your client.
Want to see some examples of what we’re describing above? Click here.
We use a state of the art Kornit Avalanche digital printer, and use a gas powered dryer to cure the inks on the shirt. Like everything else at Visual Impressions, we do things with best industry practices and the utmost quality.
Want a quote or to learn more? Click here.
Avoiding the use of halftones by printing digitally is an important advantage over screen-printing, especially when the quality of the image is a top priority. It will be interesting to see how the shirt printing industry continues to evolve, even within the next year. Thanks for sharing!