Break through the shackles of traditional concepts and look for profitable points in digital printing

Editor's note: Although there are such problems in the field of digital printing in the country, as a new generation of printing forms, printing concepts, broad market prospects for digital printing, and promising future for development, are unquestionably placed in front of printers. With the increase of social business activities, the improvement of people’s living standards and consumption levels, and the pursuit of rapidity, convenience, and fashion, personalized printing has become an inevitable need for people. It can be said that the huge market potential of personalized digital printing and the attractive ratio of investment to production are indisputable.

Digital printing or digital printing, as a new generation of printing technology and printing concept in the 21st century, has been widely recognized around the world. However, due to various reasons in China, the status quo of digital printing is indeed different from people's expectations. At present, digital printing in China can only be used as a complement to traditional printing, and survive in the gap. Although we can see various fast-printing shops on both sides of the street, there are indeed only a handful of truly-scale companies. In particular, there is a clear gap between the CTP technology, which is also in the digital domain, and the rapid development in China, where is the problem?

As a businessman, the interests are always in the first place. “If we do everything in one thousand, do business at a loss,” we can easily understand the basic principles and helplessness as a businessman.

There is no universally accepted standard definition for digital printing. In simple terms can be divided into two perspectives

1. One is the view of the computer industry. In the computer industry, the technical process that people use to output data to paper is called digital printing, whether it is black and white or color. Therefore, people also refer to digital printers in this sense as printers.

2. In the printing industry, people use digital information instead of traditional analog information. The printing technology that directly transfers digital image information to printing materials is called digital printing.

In recent years, the rapid development of the digital printing industry has been a relatively good development business. The printing company's operating philosophy includes the rational use of printing equipment and digital printing equipment. At the same time, with the rapid development of large-format inkjet printing technology and higher-speed laser printing technology, the boundary between printing equipment and large-scale digital printing presses has become increasingly blurred.

First, digital printing is profitable

Because people's awareness of digital printing is not enough, comparing traditional offset printing with digital printing leads to a very low profit for digital printing. In recent years, although people have gradually accepted digital printing, some small color laser printers have had a great impact on the market of large-scale digital printers at a low printing price and have diverted many customers. However, many companies have achieved impressive results in the field of digital printing, and have opened many chain stores in different cities.

Compared with traditional printing equipment, which is often in the millions or even tens of millions, digital printing equipment is still relatively cheap, but the printed matter produced by digital printing has a significant gap in quality from traditional offset printing products. Of course, this is due to the immaturity of technology. With the advancement of technology, the improvement of printing quality is only a matter of time. However, what we often hear is the frustration of digital printing practitioners. Profitability is not profitable. Is the price problem an insurmountable gap?

From this we use a set of data to make everyone understand more clearly. Take the example of an ordinary printing shop:
Rent = 2000 yuan 1 second-hand printer total price = 30000 yuan per A3 share of equipment depreciation (if the life of this equipment is 100,000 print) = 30000 ÷ 100000 = 0.3 yuan A3 single-sheet cost total = 0.3 (per device Depreciation expense) +0.5 (A3 leaflet printing cost) +0.3 (Paper cost) = 1.1 yuan Print sales income = 1.5 (A3 leaflet sales price) × 10000 = 15,000 yuan Bookbinding income = 3,000 yuan Net profit = 15,000 + 3000- 11000-2000-2000 (manual, utilities, etc.) = 3,000 yuan

From this point of view, the street shop can earn money for each A3 price of 1.5 yuan, and the operating costs are also very low. In addition, according to an operator, these street-side shops are sometimes even more expensive than the regular fast-print shops and charge according to the A4.

Second, the status quo of international digital printing development

Take the US market survey as an example: By 2006, multi-version and personalized printing jobs will account for 33% of the commercial printing market, while 78% of print jobs will not exceed 5,000 batches. The annual growth rate of on-demand printing Up to 14%.

According to the results of the United States investigation and research, by 2010, digital printing methods (including the following digital and desktop technology printing methods) will account for about 20% of the market share in the printing field. According to authoritative reports, the annual growth rate of on-demand printing in digital printing in the world will reach 12% in 2008, variable information printing will account for 20% of the printing market by 2007, and 20% of user requirements will be achieved by 2010. The payment cycle will be within 24 hours, and currently 78% of color print jobs are less than 5000 copies.

With the advantages of flexibility, customization, and short cycle time, digital printing has extremely fast growth. The global growth rate has reached 16%, which is 8 times that of traditional printing. The number of installations of North American color digital printing systems is expected to reach 18,700 in 2007, and the print volume of North American color digital printing systems is expected to reach 45 billion in 2007. The proportion of variable digital printing in color digital printing will increase from 16% in 2003 to 30% by 2007.

Third, the main development direction of digital printing

1. On-demand printing market

On-demand printing POD, English full name "Printon-Demand". Mainly for publications that are frequently revised and need to be updated, such as manuals, documents, and policy brochures, etc., can be easily completed through the system. And it is also particularly suitable for printing publications that incorporate many pictures, such as scientific and technical publications including charts, photos and software, screen displays.

In the conventional conventional offset printing, when the number of printing is less than 5,000 copies, it is called short-run printing. Such printing jobs have obvious high costs due to various costs such as plate making and proofing. The digital printing press has these aspects. Unique advantages, so in the United States digital printing has occupied 85% of the previous livelihoods on small presses and copiers.

From the internationally successful experience, we can see that digital printing is undoubtedly the preferred printing method when printing short-lived jobs and urgently needed jobs in short time. For example, a company can create a new product catalogue at the headquarters, and then send the documents to the local branch offices to print it locally and complete it in a short time. For the traditional printing cumbersome quotations, plate making, proofing process, but also to send someone to verify, save not only time, there are considerable transportation costs.

2. Variable data input printing

Traditional printing does not allow the printing of variable information. With traditional printing, prepress work, plate making, and printing on the press can be performed. It can print thousands of pages and it looks exactly the same. We can say that this kind of information is immutable, and the page is also immutable.

Most digital presses are capable of printing variable information. Different names and addresses can be used on different pages. The ability to print variable information and the results of variable printing are determined based on the content customized by the user. In order to complete the user-customizable variable information printing, static pages can be completed by conventional printers, and many digital printings can perform variable information printing. For example, DocuTech, HP Indigo, Xeikon, and Chromapress can all get information from one database and generate different information on different pages.

Therefore, in digital printing, the image or text on each page can be continuously changed in one printing. People call it personal printing. This demand cannot be solved in traditional printing.

Fourth, the development of digital printing in China

For some reasons, China’s commodity market is always the largest, but the largest market can not explain anything, but it shows that the development potential is great. Statistics show that the growth rate of digital printing in China is less than 5%, while the growth rate of digital printing in developed countries is 10%. China's digital printing market is mainly concentrated in the two fields of commercial printing and book printing. 80% of products are still concentrated on tenders. Few manufacturers are involved in the field of packaging and printing.

Of course, this is inseparable from the performance of the usual digital printing equipment, the smaller format (mostly A3 size), thin paper printing, especially in the printing quality and the relatively mature development of today's technology, the gap between the offset is very clear, this is undoubted It is also a bottleneck for digital printing to exert its potential in the field of packaging and printing.

From the theoretical point of view, we see the advantages of digital printing in on-demand printing. However, the current situation in the printing industry in China is that small offset printing is flooded with the short-run printing market. China's cheap labor force makes the price of small offset printing products very low, and forms a great competition for digital printing so that digital printing that can be developed abroad can be printed in China. The development is even more difficult.

There is also a problem of consumer attitudes. The economic foundation determines that our concept of consumption is still on the basis of “good and cheap”. The constant pursuit of personalized and efficient service in Europe and the United States is not so important here, which makes the advantages of digital printing further here. Discounted. Many digital printing companies have this feeling that there are fewer repeat customers. Because people will habitually think that they got a higher price and get something that would be better, but when customers see the actual product, it will produce a psychological gap, resulting in misunderstandings and ignoring the convenience Fast benefits.

Second, China's digital printing has developed in different regions.