Artgrafix Blog

Over the past several months, I have seen our competitors invest to fabricate similar products, make deals with our suppliers to promote similar products and have seen others bring out new products which may have an impact.  It is common to get so absorped in your new products and promotions to assume you are the only company moving forward, but I can assure you everyone is moving forward or they are going to go out of business.  Knowing what is going on is critical to our success so we can adjust to it, learn and get better and counteract those moves.  It keeps you from some unpleasant market surprises.

We spend a lot of time talking with others in the industry - both customers, manufacturers and distributors who are usually a little different than us, as well as monitoring the web sites of our competitors.   Our suppliers are successful and as such supply a number of our competitors (after all we can’t guarantee their mortgage payment and we need our manufacturers to be very successful so they are in a position to do things for us).  We often ask our suppliers about things we see on our competitor’s websites.  If it is not their product they will be more than happy to tell you why the item is not that good!  And if it is a good product, it may be a product your customers need you to offer them.

Also, you may find that your competitor is going in a different direction or focusing on a different market than you and that is good to know too.  While most of the things that drive us originate from our customers, knowing what is going on helps us do a better job, and that is what it is all about.

So cultivate your network of contacts.  I encourage everyone who works for me to do the same.  Also it can be fun.  I have spent 25+ years in this industry (don’t guess my age now!) and know and like a lot of folks in our industry and it can fun to gossip about them (always in a nosey, but positive way - and I assume they gossip about me too!)  It may not sound adult, but I only say that to illustrate that it can be fun to keep up on everything and make your business better at the same time.

An exciting new product we are working on is our pressure sensitive or cold Liner Free Laminates.   Most conventional cold over-laminating films have a crack and peel liner which you need to remove to expose the adhesive. Removing this can be a little tricky and require a learning curve.  You need to insure they are afixed to the take-up mechanism securely and you need to take them off in a continuous motion so you do not get lines in your finish.  This is the toughest part of learning to use a cold laminator and the leading reason people spend more money to buy a hot laminator to use heat adhesive films. 

We have been working with polypropolene films top-coated with a non-stick silicon coating which eliminates the need for the crack and peel liner.  These can be used on any cold laminator, even those without a take-up mechanism such as the Drytac Jetmounters and inexpensive laminators.

What we have found is that while you can get some silvering (which you can also get with conventional laminates), the results are more than acceptable for short-term graphics which need protection.  And you have to give the adhesive some time to flow which eliminates and ridges in the adhesive.  But you won’t get a line in your in your print and your success rate will increase tremendously.  And as with all cold adhesives, they will stiock to more types of papers than heat adhesives.

we are at the beginning of this product category and if you want to try a sample, all it will cost you is to call us up with your feedback.

While we can not replicate all of the embossed textures and hard coat surfaces of traditional films yet, the represent a good choice for many applications and with their speed and success rate, can help to improve the profitability of laminating jobs.

We have all been there.  Your doing a job you have done many times with success and all you are getting are failures.  The adhesive doesn’t stick, you are getting wrinkles, etc.  And when you review all the steps you have taken, they all seem okay and identical to what you have done in the past.  Don’t think you are alone.  This happens to us several times a year.  What has happened is that something has changed.  Your first reaction may be to look at your laminator and see if it needs service, but many times, that is not the case.

Papers changes, boards change and adhesives can change.  So when things aren’t working, you need to become a detective and examine your process to determine what to do.  We always start with a quick review of the laminator.  We use an IR thermometer to check the temperature of the roll and make sure the nip is okay by placing a board between the rollers and closing them with minimal pressure and make sure we can’t move the board left or right.  If the speed seems normal, we move onto other things.

 If you are experiencing wrinkles, we check the thickness of the boards.  All boards have tolerances and if they are towards the thicker part of the tolerance,  you can have too much pressure and create wrinkles - if so turn the nip to the next largest setting.  If you are running hot prducts with wrinkles, if the board doesn’t seem too thick, the paper may have changes and need might be expanding or moving towards the heat and sticking prematurely.  Papers, like boards, have tolerances too.  You can turn the heat down or just hold onto the end of the print to keep it from moving towards the roll.

If you print is not sticking to the board (as was the case earlier this year when Gator changed their manufacturing process) try preparing your board by wiping it with rubbing alcohol to neutralize any chemicals in the surface.  If that fails or if you are having issues with adhesive sticking to your print, you may need to try a more aggressive adhesive.  If using a heat process you may need to try a cold adhesive.

The key thing to keep in mind is the issue probably has nothing to do with what you are doing.  One of the manufacturers could have a small change (often unbeknowned to their dealers), that while within their tolerances does not react well with the other components you are using.  Just review your process and see what can be tweaked.  Call your laminating supplier.  It is possible that we have heard of similar issues (in addition to Gator changes, Epson has changed their premium papers this year too) and we know how others have worked through the problem.  Five minutes on the phone can sometimes eliminate an hour of frustration.  And just so you know, we do call others who we know run similar films and laminators and picked their brains when these happen to us.