Sometimes a standard-sized document doesn’t send a strong enough message or accommodate your needs and your printing jobs simply need to be bigger. This is when companies and government agencies alike turn to wide format printers. These devices print on large paper types or mediums, usually ranging from 18 inches to over 100 inches in width. They are used for printing things such as signs, blueprints, banners, posters, and trade show graphics with the flexibility to print on a wide variety of substrates such as various grades of paper, vinyl, canvas, PVC, wood, aluminum, or textiles.
Printing with a wide format printer offers you unparalleled flexibility, which is why when it comes to printing, bigger is better for certain industries. Read on to learn why wide format printers are particularly valuable in marketing; architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC); and government agencies.
Helping Marketers Stand Out
There are a plethora of products and services available today, and it can be a real challenge for businesses to bring the right kind of attention to their brand amongst all of the competition. That’s why marketing your company is as important as ever. The first step in effective marketing is being seen, and wide format printing is certainly a step in the right direction toward that goal. Wide format printers offer more than just the ability to print big items such as signs and banners. They can also produce large-scale graphics that can be displayed across floors, walls, windows, and trade show booths to really make your brand and message stand out.
Of course, creativity, innovation, and marketing impact remain essential—it’s not enough to just show off your logo in super-size formats. Often it is about using techniques such as guerrilla marketing and creating attention-grabbing imagery to place in the optimal location to raise awareness of your business, product, or promotion. Wide format printers not only enable you to create marketing messages that are big in size but also allow you to produce them on materials, unlike paper, that are suited for different environments. Adhesives make it possible for you to apply your graphics to almost any surface. Printing on banner vinyl is perfect for the harsh elements that exist outdoors. Mylar film provides you with a water-proof medium that can be drawn on as well. Wide format printers make it possible for marketers to create materials big enough to be seen and flexible enough to be placed anywhere.
Laying the Groundwork for Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Firms
The AEC industry spends a lot of time working with large-scale documents, as plans, drawings, and blueprints are part of their everyday business. These materials are imperative when it comes to getting the job done in this industry. Further upping the ante, building plans often go through several revisions and frequently updated. Therefore, having an in-house wide format printer is a much more practical and cost-effective option than having to run to the print shop every time a new version needs to be printed.
With access to their own wide format printer, AEC firms have the ability to:
- Print on-demand
- Speed up their turn-around time
- Meet deadlines more consistently
- Improve productivity
- Lower their cost-per-print
When it comes to investing in a wide format printer for an architecture, engineering, and construction firm, adding just any wide format device to your printing fleet won’t cut it. Not for this industry. Construction happens outdoors and, in the elements, which means your printed materials will be removed from the environmentally controlled confines of an office. They will be exposed to sunlight, water, wind, etc. As a result, your plans and blueprints must be able to stand up to the rigors of a construction site. That means your output needs to be durable, able to resist water damage and fading without being laminated. So, when shopping for a device, AEC firms should look for wide format printers that use pigment-based ink, which is water-resistant and can potentially retain its color for centuries, as opposed to dye-based inks which can fade over time. This will help your printed materials keep their sharp details and bright colors despite the harsh conditions they’re exposed to.
Keeping Government Agencies within Budget
Government agencies often need high-quality large prints to review on local, state, and federal levels, but they increasingly face shrinking budgets that make cost-effectiveness a bigger priority than in perhaps any other industry. And in this line of work, the confidentiality of sensitive information is essential. Thankfully, modern wide format printing technology can accommodate both of these factors.
A wide format device with a dual roll feeder will provide you with more flexibility when it comes to media sizes, allowing you to load multiple sizes of substrates and conveniently print a wide variety of materials from a single machine. Scanning capabilities allow you to digitize your wide-format documents in-house, eliminating the need to outsource these jobs to a print shop. Advanced security measures such as encrypted hard drives and device authentication tokens will help ensure confidential data is not compromised.
Wide format printers aren’t for every business, but marketers; architecture, engineering, and construction firms; and government agencies regularly need to print over-sized materials on non-standard substrates. If you’re in one of these industries, having one of these devices in-house will provide you with the convenience of printing on-demand at a far more cost-effective price compared to outsourcing all of your print jobs. Regardless of whether your Green Bay, Fox Valley, Lakeshore or Milwaukee area business operates in one of these industries, if you’re interested in learning more about our wide format printers or ready to bring one into your workplace, contact Wisconsin Document Imaging today.