Printing Companies
  1. About Printing Industry
  2. Printing Services
  3. Print Buyers
  4. Printing Resources
  5. Classified Ads
  6. Printing Glossary
  7. Printing Newsletters
  8. Contact Print Industry
Who We Are

Printing Industry Exchange (printindustry.com) is pleased to have Steven Waxman writing and managing the Printing Industry Blog. As a printing consultant, Steven teaches corporations how to save money buying printing, brokers printing services, and teaches prepress techniques. Steven has been in the printing industry for thirty-three years working as a writer, editor, print buyer, photographer, graphic designer, art director, and production manager.

Need a Printing Quote from multiple printers? click here.

Are you a Printing Company interested in joining our service? click here.

The Printing Industry Exchange (PIE) staff are experienced individuals within the printing industry that are dedicated to helping and maintaining a high standard of ethics in this business. We are a privately owned company with principals in the business having a combined total of 103 years experience in the printing industry.

PIE's staff is here to help the print buyer find competitive pricing and the right printer to do their job, and also to help the printing companies increase their revenues by providing numerous leads they can quote on and potentially get new business.

This is a free service to the print buyer. All you do is find the appropriate bid request form, fill it out, and it is emailed out to the printing companies who do that type of printing work. The printers best qualified to do your job, will email you pricing and if you decide to print your job through one of these print vendors, you contact them directly.

We have kept the PIE system simple -- we get a monthly fee from the commercial printers who belong to our service. Once the bid request is submitted, all interactions are between the print buyers and the printers.

We are here to help, you can contact us by email at info@printindustry.com.

Blog Articles for PrintIndustry.com

Archive for the ‘Screen Printing’ Category

Custom Printing: Why Screen Printing Will Always Have a Niche

Wednesday, September 21st, 2022

Photo purchased from … www.depositphotos.com

Custom screen printing is one of the oldest technologies for decorating fabric. I’ve even read about its having existed in ancient China. But if it’s this old (and if it really hasn’t changed much in the time since then), why has it been going so strong even with digital commercial printing in existence?

First of all, here’s a refresher on custom screen printing. A block out stencil is attached to a nylon (or even metal) screen. Image areas are open, while non-image areas are covered with the stencil. When a rubber squeegee is used to force screen printing ink through the screen onto the substrate (such as a garment), the open areas allow ink to print.

This process has to be repeated again and again for each color (after cleaning everything up and applying a new stencil to the screen). Different colors can be printed in register with one another, and you can even chemically produce halftone images on the screens, but overall they are of a coarse halftone ruling, so you wouldn’t get the detail available with inkjet or dye sublimation. Also, since preparatory work (and clean up) take a long time, you would use custom screen printing for longer press runs rather than shorter ones.

Regarding the popularity of screen printing for garments, I recently found an article entitled “Opportunities Ahead for Screen Printing,” by David Savastano, dated 06/23/22, that answers this question.

Here are some thoughts:

A Broad Range of Substrates

If you print on cotton, you need to use inkjet technology rather than dye sublimation, and the printed piece will fade over time with multiple washes. Pre- and post-treatment with water and heat will apparently extend the life of the design, but not indefinitely. Dye sublimation will sidestep this problem, since the dyes bond with the polyester fibers. However, dye sublimation is only appropriate for polyester fabrics.

In addition, if you use heat transfer vinyl (bonding cut-out lettering or flat graphics to fabric using heat–which is not itself a screen printing process but which is still a good, durable garment-decorating option), you have to consider the heat resistance of the substrate. Some fabrics such as nylon and polyester break down with exposure to high heat.

That said, custom screen printing faces none of these problems. The ink is thick and vibrant as well as durable. It not only seeps into the fibers of the garment but also provides a thick, raised pigmented surface. And you can use cotton, polyester, or pretty much any other fabric without much concern for the durability and washability of the final printed garment.

You can even print on water repellent fabrics.

In short, you have a lot more flexibility regarding substrates.

Special Inks

The plastisol inks (water-based fabric inks) used in custom screen printing (among other inks) have many more options than do inks for other processes. For instance, you can use “glitters, puff, textures, and high build” as well as “mirror inks, pearlescent, and metallic inks” (“Opportunities Ahead for Screen Printing”).

Available inks cover a wide range of the Pantone Matching System colors, and they can be transparent or opaque (“Opportunities Ahead for Screen Printing”).

The screen printing inks “have high wash durability, strong print opacity, and vibrant colors, and excellent stretch and elasticity…excellent screen runnability and long open times, ready-to-use straight out of the tub” (“Opportunities Ahead for Screen Printing”). This means that once you have set up a print run (even if it takes a long time), you can proceed with the job smoothly without incident. And the inks are striking and durable. Plus for flexible fabrics, such as “athleisure” and athletic garments, the inks stretch and move with the fabric.

Industrial Uses

But it’s not just for garments. For a long time, screen printing has been a mainstay of functional (or industrial) printing as well. When you look at the dashboard in your car, or even the words and numbers on your microwave oven, you’re looking at functional printing. The goal is to inform the user in a few words just how to operate a machine. Your phone and computer reflect two more examples of functional printing.

Screen printing is ideal for functional printing.

First of all, you can screen print on films, which can then be used in injection molds when manufacturing printed bottles without separate labels. CCL Label defines in-mold-labeling as:

“IML (In-Mould Labeling) is the integration of the label with the packaging during the injection. In this process, the label is placed into the IML injection mould, then melted thermoplastic polymer combines with the IML label and takes the shape of the mould.” (https://ccllabel.com/product/food-dairy-in-mould-labels/).

Combined with injection-molding packaging technology, custom screen printing is ideal for decorating and labeling the bottles. Screen printed in-mold labels on film can withstand the heat and the physical manipulation and stresses of this molding process, since the inks are flexible and since they adhere well to the film used in this process (“Opportunities Ahead for Screen Printing”). You can even print on the back of films and then integrate them into auto consoles (for instance) due to the flexibility of the inks. (This kind of screen printing would essentially be inside the plastic auto parts, so this would increase the durability of the ink.)

In addition, screen printing is great for printed electronics. That is, the circuit boards used in electronic devices can be screen printed with conductive inks, which can carry the electric charges that travel through the printed circuitry. All of this also lends itself to the interior electronic workings of automobiles (not just words on the information panels but also the printed pathways on the actual electronic circuits that control the car).

Plus you can print on glass, plastic, or metal. You can even print information on white goods such as refrigerators.

The Takeaway

Custom screen printing is flexible, vibrant, and durable. It lends itself not only to printing on garments but also to printing on appliances, cars, and computers. I’ve even seen screen printing being used to apply explanatory text to the walls of an art museum exhibit.

That said, it requires a lot of make-ready work, so it’s best for longer runs. Also, it lends itself to one-, two-, or three-color work rather than photo-realistic imagery. In part this is because the inks are thick and will plug up screens for images with a fine halftone-line-screen ruling (you can’t really print the high-resolution, 4-color imagery you can print with inkjet equipment).

So for work within it’s niche–keeping in mind its assets and limitations–it’s a good idea to know something about screen printing if you’re a designer or an art director. Perhaps you will want to print on pens, fabric messenger bags, umbrellas, even fold-up lawn chairs. Or sports caps. For these as well as the functional printing noted above, this time-honored technology is absolutely indispensable.

Commercial Printing: An Introduction to Screen Printing

Friday, November 12th, 2021

Photo purchased from … www.depositphotos.com

My First Screen Printing Experience

The summer before college I worked (one on one) with a Mexican ceramics artist. He was the artist in residence at a church attached to a local high school. Night after night I would take a bus to his studio and learn (of all things, not pottery making but) custom screen printing. He was skilled at both disciplines. (more…)

Custom Screen Printing: A Good Choice for Coating Offset Sheets

Tuesday, April 3rd, 2018

A friend and colleague of mine is a sales rep for two different book printers. (This is a little like what I do, although I’m completely independent, working with multiple printers as a representative for my clients. In contrast, as a sales rep my colleague has the firm backing of two specific book printers. One printer focuses on color work. The other focuses on black-ink-only print books.) (more…)

Options for Printing T-Shirts

Monday, October 1st, 2012

I wanted to know how t-shirts were printed, so I checked out YouTube (an incredible resource for short “how to” films). I assumed that screen printing and heat transfers would be the major methods for printing on t-shirts, and the YouTube videos confirmed my expectations. (more…)

Large Format Printing: Your Options for Political Signage

Thursday, September 13th, 2012

With the presidential election less than two months away, it’s definitely the season for political signage. And surprisingly enough, there are multiple options to consider if you need to produce this printed product for a client. (more…)

Large Format Printing: Standee Lightbox Case Study

Saturday, August 25th, 2012

As a commercial printing broker and designer, I think that certain avenues for graphic design are still expanding, in spite of the drop off in others. I’ve read a lot over the last few years about the growth in label production (particularly personalized labels), flexible packaging, and large format printing. (more…)

Case Study for Multi-Channel Marketing

Sunday, February 12th, 2012

There’s a new buzzword in printing. It’s “multi-channel marketing.” Multi-channel marketers embrace the new digital technologies rather than hide from them. They integrate offset and digital custom printing with social media and other Internet-based modes of communication. (more…)

Large Format Printing: Observations on Movie Theater Standees

Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012

As noted in prior PIE Blog articles, in addition to other custom printing related pursuits, I install “standees” and signage at movie theaters. This gives me first-hand access to many printed products I otherwise would not see. I’d like to make a few observations that you may find useful, whatever kind of custom printing products you yourself may buy. (more…)

Screen Printing with an Online Printing Company: Print on Almost Anything

Wednesday, August 10th, 2011

At some point in your schooling, maybe even in grade school, you probably did some screen printing. Maybe in art class. Using a frame with a stretched nylon screen, perhaps not as fine a mesh as a stocking, you used a squeegie to force printing ink through a stencil attached to the screen and onto the paper below. It’s a simple process, and essentially the same as commercial silkscreen (also known as screen printing or serigraphy). (more…)

Archives

Recent Posts

Categories


Read and subscribe to our newsletter!


Printing Services include all print categories listed below & more!
4-color Catalogs
Affordable Brochures: Pricing
Affordable Flyers
Book Binding Types and Printing Services
Book Print Services
Booklet, Catalog, Window Envelopes
Brochures: Promotional, Marketing
Bumper Stickers
Business Cards
Business Stationery and Envelopes
Catalog Printers
Cheap Brochures
Color, B&W Catalogs
Color Brochure Printers
Color Postcards
Commercial Book Printers
Commercial Catalog Printing
Custom Decals
Custom Labels
Custom Posters Printers
Custom Stickers, Product Labels
Custom T-shirt Prices
Decals, Labels, Stickers: Vinyl, Clear
Digital, On-Demand Books Prices
Digital Poster, Large Format Prints
Discount Brochures, Flyers Vendors
Envelope Printers, Manufacturers
Label, Sticker, Decal Companies
Letterhead, Stationary, Stationery
Magazine Publication Quotes
Monthly Newsletter Pricing
Newsletter, Flyer Printers
Newspaper Printing, Tabloid Printers
Online Book Price Quotes
Paperback Book Printers
Postcard Printers
Post Card Mailing Service
Postcards, Rackcards
Postcard Printers & Mailing Services
Post Card Direct Mail Service
Poster, Large Format Projects
Posters (Maps, Events, Conferences)
Print Custom TShirts
Screen Print Cards, Shirts
Shortrun Book Printers
Tabloid, Newsprint, Newspapers
T-shirts: Custom Printed Shirts
Tshirt Screen Printers
Printing Industry Exchange, LLC, P.O. Box 394, Bluffton, SC 29910
©2019 Printing Industry Exchange, LLC - All rights reserved