Ink isn’t just a pretty color anymore; it can be the chance to add scent or even texture to your print project. And to many, ink is another opportunity to make an environmentally sustainable choice.
In PaperSpecs’ next Webinar, “INK on Paper: Beyond Your Line of Sight,” guest speaker Jeff Ashton, vice president of Operations for Quality Inks & Rollers shares tips for using ink to enhance the creativity, sustainability and effectiveness of printed communications.
Ashton, who’s been mixing it up (literally and figuratively) for over 16 years, will cover:
- Ink Components (Pigments are just the surface!)
- Green Ink (Do you know your vegetable from your soy?)
- Eco Trends (Calculate your Bio Renewable Content.)
- Color (It’s a very sensitive issue.)
- Special Effects (There’s a certain glow about you.)
Register today. “INK on Paper: Beyond Your Line of Sight” is FREE thanks to the generous support of NEENAH PAPER.
MeadWestvaco (MWV) is now working with consumer electronics industry’s leading manufacturers like SanDisk, Lexar and others to convert packaging in retail stores worldwide from clamshells to its Natralock product.
“Consumers have been clear about their dislike for clamshells, and Natralock provides an easier-to-use solution with improved sustainability and store shelf presence,” says Jeff Kellogg, vice president of Natralock packaging, MWV.
Among other characteristics, MWV says Natralock
- Uses 60 percent less plastic on average than petroleum-based PVC clamshells
- Uses about 80 percent less energy in production
- Is made from sustainably sourced paperboard with a clear plastic APET or RPET enclosure
- The proprietary technology behind Natralock creates a high-strength, tear-resistant package that can easily be opened with scissors, leaving a smooth, safe edge and preventing the “wrap rage” commonly associated with opening traditional plastic clamshell packaging.
- Natralock is slimmer and lighter weight, which reduces warehousing space needs and transportation and shipping costs.
Wausau Paper has released a new swatchbook since increasing its Royal Metallics’ Text weight from 70 lbs. to 80 lbs.
The new Text weight offers more design choices; accommodates heavier ink coverage without bleed-through; supports embossing, diecutting, perforating, folding and other off-press techniques; and gives newsletters, brochures and business cards a rich, substantial quality.
Royal Metallics is specially formulated and guaranteed for offset printing. Inkjet optimized papers are also available in 8.5″ x 11″ and 12″ x 12″ packages. The line is acid free (archival), elemental chlorine-free (ECF), FSC certified, Green Seal certified, laser compatible in text (digital) and contains 30 percent postconsumer waste (PCW) fiber.
The heavier 80 Text is now in stock and ready to ship for next-day delivery in most markets.
As a special offer for PaperSpecs members, please log in and select “Mill Swatchbooks” to request a copy of the new Royal Metallics swatchbook.
Graphic Arts Show Company (GASC), producer of the annual GRAPH EXPO and alternating every fourth-year global PRINT events, unveiled a new print advocacy program aptly named “Positively Print.”
The program is intended to encourage companies involved in print to devote part of their ongoing advertising and promotional campaigns to a generic advocacy of print as a communications media.
“Positively Print” submissions selected for recognition by a panel of industry experts will be announced on October 2, 2010 at the annual EXECUTIVE OUTLOOK Conference, held the day before GRAPH EXPO opens, October 3-6, 2010 in Chicago’s McCormick Place.
“Although sometimes overlooked in the flurry of e-marketing, print has always been-and continues to be-a vital component of today’s integrated marketing campaigns,” stated GASC President Ralph Nappi. “These ‘best of the best’ examples of print promotional campaigns recognized by the “Positively Print” program will feature the various types, unique attributes and effectiveness of this essential media.” Submission deadline is August 2, 2010; no fee is required for participation.
The World Resources Institute (WRI), in partnership with the Environmental Investigation Agency, has prepared a four-page fact sheet about the Lacey Act, which prohibits trade in illegal plants or plant products.
The fact sheet entitled Are You Ready for the Lacey Act? answers many questions, including:
- What does the Lacey Act entail?
- What is considered “illegal” under the amended Lacey Act?
- What risks do buyers, traders and sellers of wood, paper and other forest products face if they violate the Lacey Act?
- What can companies do to avoid becoming the subject of a Lacey Act investigation?
- Does certification mean that a forest product is exempt or already in compliance with the amended Lacey Act?
The WRI says third-party forest certification is a good way to demonstrate to both government and customers that a company has taken proactive steps to eliminate illegal wood or plant material from its supply chain.
However, importers still must submit appropriate declaration information to Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service of USDA or U.S. Customs and Border Patrol. The U.S. government is taking illegal logging seriously – as demonstrated in a high-profile raid of Gibson Guitar Corporation last fall – and companies in the United States and abroad must be in compliance.
Xerox and On Demand Books will jointly market and sell, on a worldwide basis, the Xerox 4112 Copier/Printer together with the Espresso Book Machine – a fully integrated solution that prints, binds and trims books with full-color covers on demand in retail locations and libraries.
The Espresso Book Machine can produce paperbacks in variable combinations of trim sizes between 4.5″ x 5.0″ and 8.25″ x 10.5″ reportedly for a production cost less than one cent per page.
With the Xerox 4112, the Espresso Book Machine produces a 300-page book in less than four minutes and has the capacity to print more than 40,000 paperback books per year.
“The Espresso Book Machine uses EspressNet, a proprietary and copyrighted software system that connects the device to a vast network of 3.3 million titles obtained with the approval of the publishers. EspressNet assures the security of publishers’ titles, tracks all jobs and provides payments to publishers. Content owners retain full rights and control of their digital files,” said Dane Neller, CEO, On Demand Books.
“Xerox has provided a variety of digital book solutions for nearly 20 years,” said Eric Armour, president, Global Business Group, Xerox Corporation. “Working with On Demand Books, we can apply Xerox technology to meet the incredible opportunities that exist within this industry.”
According to a PRIMIR study entitled “Trends in Books: 2007-2012,” published in 2009, conventionally printed books reached the peak of their product life cycle with publishers’ net sales of 3,127 million book units in 2007.
In 2008, six major industry segments in the book industry accounted for 3.0 billion publisher net book copies valued at $35.7 billion. Printed books were headed toward a new record high in 2008 when the economic recession hit full force.
PrintCom Consulting who conducted the research concludes that by the time the economy recovers, participants in the book publishing production chain will find themselves in a smaller, very different book industry.
The study provides a comprehensive review of each of the six major book segments. It reports that although factors differ among the various book segments, overall the health of the economy and the emerging e-book and/or digital substitutions for books will clearly have a negative impact on total printed book volume. The report indicates three clear-cut conclusions:
- Book content in its present paper form will continue to be a mainstay product through the 2009-2012 forecast period, but at reduced volume levels from the industry’s recent history.
- Book content will morph from being primarily an ink-on-paper product to a multiple-media product distributed through a variety of channels.
- Paper books and their key selling outlet, bookstores, may have reached the pinnacle of their product life cycle and will emerge from the forecast period on the downside slope of the cycle.
Internet book sales, typically supported by a back-office print-on-demand model, as well as e-book downloads will continue to take their toll on traditional booksellers. And, the e-book market is heating up, both in textbook and consumer markets. (In fact one of the hottest gifts this past holiday season was the e-book reader.)
The study concludes that while it will take years for e-books to penetrate all aspects of the traditional print book market, the handwriting is on the wall. In the short term, the current economic turmoil will be the prime driver of change in the book industry. In the longer term, the continuing development of electronic competition will become the prime driver of major changes in the book industry’s products, impacting on all elements in the graphic communications industry’s supply chain.
It took seven months to hit the one billion mark, but only four more weeks to hit three billion. That’s the number of Intelligent Mail Full Service mailpieces processed by the U.S. Postal Service since the program’s implementation last May.
The milestone mailing entered the postal distribution network the week of January 4, and the actual number was confirmed on January 14.
The number of Intelligent Mail Full Service mailers increased to 171, a 60 percent increase from mid-December. To date, Intelligent Mail Full Service has generated $1 billion in revenue.
“The month of December has been one of exceptional participation and performance,” said Tom Day, senior vice president, Intelligent Mail and Address Quality. “The PostalOne! system handled more than twice the previous peak of eDoc postage statements and did so with 98 percent being processed in 30 minutes or less. Mailers are realizing the benefits of Full Service Intelligent Mail, and are doing so in a stable operating environment.”
The deadline for Sappi’s 2009/2010 North American Printers of the Year awards is February 12, 2010.
Printers can enter existing work printed between January 1, 2008 and December 31, 2009 that uses a Sappi paper as the dominant stock and is printed in the U.S. or Canada.
The 10 categories include: Annual Reports, Books, Brochures, Calendars, Catalogs, Digital Print, Magazines (sheetfed), Magazines (web), Printer’s Own Promotions, or General Print (any printed material not included in the other categories).
Printers have the opportunity to win up to $20,000 in design support of their marketing initiatives for each category and to be featured in Sappi’s upcoming searchable online database for designers, printer buyers and corporations.
The competition recognizes print excellence and innovation for work produced on Sappi papers. All entries will be judged on overall impact of the piece; degree of difficulty in the printing techniques; and technical excellence.
When Neenah Paper wanted to highlight the versatile beauty of its FSC-certified papers, they decided to tell the larger story about sustainability through a series of cutting-edge wallpaper posters designed to promote larger conversations about paper as a physical medium.
The fourth and last poster (called Biodiversity) in the Conservation Wallpaper Poster Series has just been released.
“Environmental issues tend to be deadly serious subjects that many treat with a somber tone,” said Steve Sikora, co-owner and creative director/copywriter of Design Guys, the Minneapolis-St. Paul firm who designed the posters.
Sikora said he’d like designers to respond to the Conservation Poster Series by realizing how much of an impact they have on consumer attitudes. “I once heard Milton Glaser say that he made ‘no distinction between good design and good citizenship.’ That isn’t the way most of us begin thinking about our work, but I think he is exactly right.”
As a special offer for PaperSpecs members, please log in and select “Mill Promotions” to request your “Biodiversity” poster.
Ink isn’t just a pretty color anymore; it can be the chance to add scent or even texture to your print project. And to many, ink is another opportunity to make an environmentally sustainable choice.
