Looking to Expand Services

[Mark Sipes]

To those that offer engraving and promotional services to their communities and beyond.......

I am looking to expand my offerings to the business sector but need ideas on what equipment to offer.

Had looked at Pad Printing early on but pretty sure that is a dead industry (& time consuming). With the advent of UV direct to substrate.

How many of you offer UV printing and what volume/products do you offer. ???

I have only looked at the UV2400 (LogoJet) which has a good sized table ± 12 x 24 . ($25k)

Would like additional models to look at, with your help.



Thanks in advance.



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[Gary Hair]

I would recommend looking at a DCS printer. I've had DCS1024DD for a couple of years and am happy with it. I don't really market it but still do over $1,000/month printing on customer products. That's mostly one customer and could be much higher if I had the time to actually market that service. I know it's a ways from Eugene, but you are welcome to come here and see the printer and see it working. You could also contact my sales rep, he is out of Seattle, I'm sure he'd be happy to do a demo for you.
I agree completely with your pad printing opinion. I looked into it years ago and thought it was pretty dead then and way too much work for what you get out of it.

[Rodne Gold]

If you use colour laser toner transfer .. you can do full colour prints on most uncoated things like wood and acrylic , metals and so on
All it requires is a colour laser printer and heat press.. you can go up to a3 with a suitable printer and press..
Not a lot of money and easy technology
The Magic Touch is the go to place

[Tony Lenkic]

Gary,

Do you know if DCS was purchased by GoVivid a Rowmark company?

Mark, look at GoVivid , Mimaki, Roland, Mutoh and number of other UV desktop printers and compare features and prices.

[Ross Moshinsky]

Pad printing for a small shop isn't an option. Pad printing and silk screening in a big operation is still the most affordable way to mass produce items and I'm not sure that's going to change in the next 20 years. Just think you're a pen company and you're doing a standard 1 color print. What's going to be faster, pad printing it or direct printing? I'm confident it's pad printing and it's going to be by a fair margin. For a small shop, I think the versatility of direct print makes the most sense. It can print 1 or a million colors. It can print on "anything". No real crazy setups. It can work and you'll walk away. It's crazy versatile.

I'd imagine we're going to have to buy a direct to sub printer in the next 5 years, but as of right now it hasn't made it on the shopping list for two reasons.

The first being I feel I can do a lot of the same things with my equipment now. It won't look the same but at the end of the day if the task is to get this color logo on that object, I can do it more often than not. Paying $20-30k for a printer that is just going to shift revenue from one piece of equipment to another is kind of crazy to me.

The second is competing with the big boys. On orders where you're doing 10-20 pieces, it's not an issue as the big boys aren't interested. On 150 piece orders, I question whether outsourcing isn't the best option. Granted your overall profit is lower but let's assume you're selling a widget for $25 and your cost with shipping is $17. Let's also assume the order is for 100 pcs. You're going to make $800 for maybe 2 hours of work between dealing with the customer, artwork, and placing the order. Meanwhile let's pretend you can buy the blank and DIY for $10. Obviously that's $1000 profit. Let's also assume it takes 2 hours labor to actually complete the job which means you're making $100/hr extra. Assuming you do 1 job a week like this, and you're able to take $50 of the $100 for the business, you're looking at $400/month to pay off the printer. At $25k purchase price, you're looking at pay off of 250 weeks. We're also in an area where labor rates and COL is very high so going into this type of work is difficult.

[Gary Hair]

No, I don't know for sure, however, I don't think so.


Gary,

Do you know if DCS was purchased by GoVivid a Rowmark company?

Mark, look at GoVivid , Mimaki, Roland, Mutoh and number of other UV desktop printers and compare features and prices.

[Mike Null]

I'd love to have a UV printer but I don't have enough volume to consider it. I think Ross explained it pretty well. I know of a fairly high volume shop (9 employees) that doesn't make enough to cover their lease on the Mimaki they have. I know of another shop who can hardly keep up with the work load on their printer. A case like Gary where the customer came first and they needed to buy a printer to handle his business.

I use color laser transfer, dye sublimation, and a card printer to avail myself of color.

[Tony Lenkic]

Take a look here.........
http://www.govividusa.com/products/DCS-MVP

[Gary Hair]

Take a look here.........
http://www.govividusa.com/products/DCS-MVP

Once again, that's what I get for thinking...

I wonder when that happened?

[Bert Kemp]

GoVivid had some demo's setup at a laserbits open house a couple months back. Really impressive machines.

[Tony Lenkic]

GoVivid had some demo's setup at a laserbits open house a couple months back. Really impressive machines.


Yes impressive and with price tag to match.

[Gary Hair]

Take a look here.........
http://www.govividusa.com/products/DCS-MVP

This from my rep:

"It's a marketing alliance.
No one owns anyone.
GoVivid is selling our machines as a dealer"

[Tony Lenkic]

Marketing Alliance, Eh!
I was thinking "Rowmark buys out another one". You know how aggressive they have been in last few years.

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

Marketing Alliance, Eh!
I was thinking "Rowmark buys out another one". You know how aggressive they have been in last few years.

It doesn't look like Rowmark bought them or are allied with them. It appears that Rowmark created GoVivid.

http://www.rowmarkllc.com/news/2015/01/23/main/rowmark-llc-announces-digital-printing-business-division/

[Mark Sipes]

GoVivid the worst website I have ever seen.......... goes nowhere...... show me a printer...please !!! none only products to print onto............


Rowmark ---- makes since!! unless I am missing something yo'all are referring too.



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[Tony Lenkic]

It appears that Rowmark created GoVivid.


Mike,

The story behind GoVivid is bit deeper. Rowmark did not create it, they are manufactures of plastics not printers.

[Bert Kemp]

I didn't say they were cheap:eek: yep pretty $ tag on them.


Yes impressive and with price tag to match.

[Mike Null]

Mark

Did you check this site? I felt there was quite a lot of info available . http://www.govividusa.com/products/govivid-breeze

DSC has been around a long time and Rowmark with their various divisions has been my "go to" supplier for nearly 20 years. That's because I like the way they do business.

[Glen Monaghan]

As I understand it, Rowmark bought GoVivid for their UV printing line (their printers are free-standing, bigger than desktop printers). DCS converts Epson printer mechanisms to make desktop UV printers. Rowmark/GoVivid "teamed" with DCS so as to offer a wider range of printers without having to buy/build their own, but they remain separate companies.

[Mark Sipes]

Thanks Gary... seem to be the only one on the forum that has a Direct to Substrate Printer... appreciate the feedback and guidance. Have made contact with DCS and may stop by the NBM (Portland show in Oct 14-15) to see what is showing specials..

[Tim Bateson]

My 2 cents... A couple years ago, I expanded into Sublimation, Color Laser Transfers, Vinyl lettering/Graphics, and even Vehicle Wraps (Good $ but not as easy as it looks). I was wise enough to contract out the vehicle wrap printing, which still left good margins for me. My intent was to test the market without a major investment.
Although I enjoy doing all of those and any of which would do well by me, I found I was too spread across the spectrum. I still do the occasional Sublimation, but everything else is now gathering dust as I decided to focus on my primary money train - lasering.

[Mark Sipes]

Tim, glad you rejoined the group. Laser business it great, sublimation is fantastic and rotary/drag is as expected.... but there is still 9 hours in the day for a profit to be made......

Trust me I am asking the local market if they will support the acquistion of my new equipment..... but in my area four businesses in the field have gone under and the field is opening to fill the vacuum....... consolidation is the mantra of the day.


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