Market Trends Favorable for Digital Embellishment

With everything that is going on in the world due to the pandemic, it is difficult to realize that there are some rare opportunities that are evolving from the situation. Here are a few things the JETforce in North America has seen that is pushing in the favor of digital embellishment.

Supply Chain: Paper Shortage Helping Push Digital Printing

We have seen a recent acceleration in digital embellishment market adoption, and it’s crucial to realize why. A couple of critical things that we’re seeing is an increase in shorter runs because the stress in the supply chain has made the production of goods more difficult to produce, so brands have had to scale down their production while waiting for their supply chains to pick back up.

It isn’t very easy to do a run of 100,000 or 500,000 at the moment. Many manufacturers will opt for shorter runs as the raw materials slowly come in and their products are manufactured. Because of COVID, the supply chain squeeze is helping push jobs towards on-demand digital print production processes as brands experience difficulties producing goods on the aggregate.

No product, perhaps asides from the semiconductor industry, is as difficult to source as paper substrates are at the moment. Most companies don’t have enough paper and board in stock to satisfy demand, and the printers that do hold all the cards. The paper scarcity has forced companies to print and finish shorter runs, digitally, due to the limited paper in stock.

How are your customers reacting to the supply chain issues in printing, specifically paper sourcing?

Brand Education

We’re also seeing brands beginning to understand the impact of how digital print and finishing technologies could help them meet their sustainability goals.

While the print industry does plant more trees than it cuts down, more brands must realize what they stand to gain if they go to a digital print production process.

In the past, brands have generally assumed a digital print process meant it would be too expensive. Today, many still think this way, but more and more understand that reducing the number of overprints and waste can save them money and meet their sustainability goals.

A critical study came out this year from the world advertising research center. They proved that packaging was the second most effective channel when it came to media, after videos.

As impressive as that statistic is, only five percent of the surveyed brands currently consider their packaging as a growth enabler.

This means 95% of the brands represented in the study are unaware or resistant to embrace digital because they still believe print that’s produced digitally or finished digitally is too expensive or don’t fully understand the impact. Printers have a massive opportunity to educate their customers on the power of “fantastic” packaging.

If we look at the next significant generation who will be holding the purchasing power soon, Generation Z, 53% surveyed said they want the brands they buy from to offer them a way to personalize or customize products to them.

This is, again, an excellent opportunity for digital.

Increase In Players

We’ve also seen an increase in market players from the manufacturing side. There are significantly more players in the digital embellishment space, contributing to more units being in the field. A dozen or more manufacturers have joined the game and begun pushing the digital embellishment market up the adoption curve.

The more players are in the game, and the more overall units there are in the field.

Manufacturers realize that there’s profit in this market and want to make machines that meet market expectations.

The next logical step happens when the people who invest in this equipment begin individually and collectively educating the designers, the agencies, the print buyers, and the brands at the local or regional level.

Reorder Rates

Additionally, we see high levels of embellished reorder rates, meaning that brands who try digital embellishment once, and the reaction is strong enough that often times when they go back to reorder, the marketing department specify specific embellishments.

The “just try it once and then you’re hooked” model works so well, many digital embellishment users report doing the first job for a brand at or below cost. They do this so that the brands can experience the reactions for themselves, knowing they will likely follow up with a digitally embellished reorder on their next project.

Finally, there is a renewed desire to make something memorable when it comes to print. In terms of print, if it’s categorized as an informational-based print, it can be in many cases transferred to an online distribution source as there is no genuine desire to print yesterday’s news.

A Renewed Interest in “Sexy Print”

Today, we see that if something is going to merit being printed, there is a desire to spend a little more to make it unique as it needs to get somebody’s attention, provided it is environmentally sustainable. Whether done via analog or digital processes, embellishment is making a big comeback as of recently.