Wide-Format Printers, (UV, Textile, Solvent, Latex)

Transcription

1 Trade Trade Show Show December 2015 Inks, Media & Substrates Cutters & Laminators; RIP Software Nicholas Hellmuth & Pablo M. Lee 1

2 contents - All items on this list are hot links. - - had a remarkable diversity of: 3 - After market inks 4 - Media and Substrates 5 - Toner 5 - UV-Cured Printers 6 EFI VUTEk 6 FLORA (RTZ) 8 Dilli 9 iti 10 - There were many other brands of UV-cured printers at SGIA 12 - New Brands of UV-cured Printers 13 Vanguard 13 - Textile Printers 14 DigiFab 15 efi REGGIANI 16 - Calendering Machines 17 DigiHeat 17 - T-Shirt Printers 18-3D 18 - To Improve the conditions in your print shop 19 - Screen printing 20 - MEMS printhead and one pass technology 21 - Roll-fed Cutters 22 - Cutters 23 - RIP Software 25 - MIS, Web-to-Print, and other Workflow Software 26 - Scanners 27 - Accessories 28 - Distributors 29 - Trade Magazines 30 - Educator Row 31 - Suggestions for a good lightweight camera to use 32 - Booth Design, especially overhead booth logo displays 33 - Atlanta as a venue 35 - A little bit about Atlanta 37 - SGIA as a trade show 38 - Well Organized Aspects of SGIA 39 - Atlanta Convention Center Buildings 41 - Expo Hall, was easy to find each aisle 42 - Exhibitor Director and Maps were nice 43 - I always appreciate booths with Teddy Bears or T-shirts 44 2

3 had a remarkable diversity of: Inkjet printers, UV-cured Roll-to-roll, up to 5 meter width Dedicated flatbed (some with RtR across front) Combo transport belt: flatbed + RtR capability Desktop flatbed Mid-sized (larger desktop with their own base) Even industrial units of UV-cured Textile wide-format Entry-level textile printers (direct to fabric) Mid-range Serious full time textile printers (efi Reggiani as one example) T-shirt printers Pigment ink T-shirt Dye-sublimation T-shirt Toner sublimation T-shirt Sublimation for coffee mugs, plates, plaques Solvent printers Eco-solvent Mild-solvent (lite-solvent) There are almost never any more full solvent in USA or western Europe printer trade shows. But full-solvent printers are still being manufactured in Asia. Latex printers (lots of co-solvents so not really fully acceptable as water-based Water-based printers (Epson, HP, Canon) After-market inks, Laminators and coaters, Cutters XY digital flatbed cutters CNC routers CO2 laser engravers Sophisticated roll-fed cutters (FOTOBA is the best example) Entry-level roll-fed cutters (GCC is a good example) RIP software, MIS and related software, Plus even color management tools (spectrophotometer) 3

4 after market inks Every year some ink companies go up worldwide, and other ink companies unfortunately have a hiccup. So one ink company was totally missing at SGIA (and also missing at Sign Istanbul a few weeks before SGIA). But, when one brand is no longer present, there is always a competitor that moves into the scene. If you need to keep track of every brand of every ink company who exhibits, there is a separate FLAAR Report (since otherwise all the photos of every brand would cause this PDF to be too many megapixels and thus not easy to send with an , nor even to download). For example, here is the colorful booth wall display of IIMAK Inks, which now handles the American Ink Jet brand. 4

5 Media and Substrates In a trade show of such dimensions is not a surprise to find more than 85 companies engaged in digital printing material. The world record for exhibitors is APPPEXPO with 176 brands, but 85 booths for is frankly better than any VISCOM ina ny city in Europe. In the TRENDs level FLAAR Report we carefully compare the range of media and substrates at each major expo around the world. This information is crucial both for manufacturers, distributors, and print shop owners and managers, so they can keep track of what kinds of media are becoming more popular, and which kinds of media are hard to find. TONER The FLAAR Reports focus on inkjet technology, but we do keep track of toner chemistry and products as well. By far the most notable image at the entire expo was this one from icolor Fluorescent Toners. I am not familiar with this company nor with their products (other than this remarkable image). icolor toner sample 5

6 UV-Cured Printers PR agencies seem to have indigestion, which cause them to make ridiculous claims? One brochure said The world s only wide-format UV flatbed that can print on material 6-inches thick Really? Why do I find a LOGOJET a few aisles away that fits products up to 6 in height? And how many Chinese printers can handle up to 6 in height OR MORE? I bet the Sun (Russian) printer can do more than six inches (would have to check, this is merely a point that you would need to have a tabulation of every UV-cured printer to document this statement). It is unexpected that a Japanese printer company would make a claim that was not true even one aisle away. EFI VUTEk At the efi Press Conference they mentioned 3M Printable Fabric 9100 with up to 6 year 3M warranty (for vertical applications) using ultra-matte overlaminate. This documents that efi is teaming up with both premier ink and laminate companies to provide a total solution. EFI Armor I would definitely want to learn more about (it has been many years since I was brought to an efi demo center). Several years ago an experienced printing company in Illinois said that their UV-cured laminator was their secret weapon to win clients and beat competition (since competing print shops did not have the UV-cured laminator). So I am interested in learning more about the inline clear-coat of UltraFX Technology. 6 EFI had a wide range of their VUTEk printers, plus now also an EFI Matan printer. Efi VUTEk GS3LXPro Efi VUTEk HS125Pro Efi VUTEk GS5500 LXr Pro, Efi VUTEk H2000 Pro Efi MATAN QUANTUM, current version has Ricoh Gen 5; earlier had Gen 3. Efi VUTEk HS1625-SD Efi VUTEk HS1625 LED

7 Efi VUTEk UV printer Efi VUTEk UV printer 7

8 FLORA (RTZ) UV printer at Flora booth RTZ, Flora PP 2512UV, KM1024i printheads RTZ, Flora F1 320 UV, roll-to-roll, KM 1024 printheads. Jiang Hong, General Manager, was present at SGIA expo, along with his capable staff and printer operators. RTZ has one of the larger printer factories in China and abundant experience manufacturing UV-cured printers. This is why companies are going to RTZ for them to contractmanufacture printers to be rebranded around the world. 8

9 Dilli UV printer at Dilli booth Dilli NEO TITAN 1604D-W2V Dilli NEO SUN HB2504D-W2X Dilli NEO TITAN RTR 3404DX Korean technology has more years making UV-cured printers than most other manufacturers in Asia (Roland took 13 years to come even close to developing a real flatbed UV-cured printer; Mutoh Japan still does not have one (but dozens and dozens of Chinese factories crank out flatbeds by the ton, for many years). Dilli offers dedicated flatbed, dedicated roll-to-roll, and a nice combo: with transfer belt so it can do roll and flat materials all on the same printer. 9

10 iti This is the second major trade show for iti. This time they had a second printer on exhibit. FLAAR has inspected the iti dedicated flatbed printer at their demo room in California several months ago. Frankly the print quality was as good as many $200,000 UV-cured flatbed printers. Here is a hot link to the evaluation. iti booth at Most of our evaluations are at either the factory or the main demo room. So during the last 15 years we have been flown to the demo rooms, ink labs, signage media factories, RIP software headquarters, color management spectrophotometer factory and demo room, textile printer factories, UV-cured printer factories. 10

11 Actually being in the printer, ink, or media headquarters and demo room is how we can bring to our thousands of readers a written commentary of the results of our inspecting a printer, ink, laminator, media, or software in-person. Dr Nicholas flies about 150,000 kilometers a year, speaks three languages (and understands several more even though he can t speak them), and enjoys assisting wide-format printer brands by providing knowledge and assistance on TRENDs in inks and printers. He has lived in Beijing 6 weeks (with three other of the FLAAR Team) helping organize, translate, and improve the web sites and brochures of a Chinese wide-format inkjet related company. Dr Nicholas was a visiting research professor at the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka, Japan for 6 months (and comparable position at the University of Malta for as a consultant for a busy several weeks on improving digital photography for cultural history preservation). Nicholas has lived in Switzerland 3 years, Austria 8 years (including being an instructor for pre-columbian archaeology of Mesoamerica at the University of Graz), Germany 9 years, and worked most of his life in Mexico and adjacent Central America. This is why FLAAR is multi-cultural and works internationally (for example, as consultant for trade shows in Dubai, Istanbul, Shanghai, Johannesburg, and as annual speaker in Miami (Graphics of the Americas). If you have a demo room for inks, media, substrates, software, printers, laminators, or cutters, you can cover the costs to fly Dr Hellmuth (and also the textile or other managers at FLAAR Reports) to your factory. We do this as a research project to help provide information that goes far beyond any press release. Contact us at FrontDesk at FLAAR.org 11

12 There were many other brands of UV-cured printers at SGIA Agfa had the new models they first showed at ISA earlier this year. I would need to inspect these at a demo room to do a realistic evaluation of to what degree these can compete with Durst and comparable brands. It would help all competitors (and end-users) when there are several competing brands at each level: entry-level, mid-range, and high-end. There were also at least two industrial brands of printers. Industrial printers are a good future (as more signage goes to LED and LCD dynamic digital technology). We cover the industrial brand(s) in our TRENDs level FLAAR Reports. Mimaki applications samples Mimaki definitely had an attractive print sample display. The AGFA booth also tends to have nice displays as does the Oce booth at most expos. 12

13 New Brands of UV-cured Printers Dave Cich was one of the significant factors in the growth of CET, a Vanguard company which initiated bringing Handtop printers from China. In the Middle East, South Africa, and Eastern Europe printers from Handtop in Shenzhen, China have been increasingly popular under their factory brand name. But in addition to the printers themselves, it is a definite asset to have a key person (such as Dave Cich) with prior experience as a sales manager for Oce Arizona flatbed printers. For a variety of reasons Dave Cich has left CET to start his own company, Vanguard. His new brand already has their own printer (they developed this printer from resources of colleagues). Interesting that Mutoh in 15 years has not been able to develop such a printer and it took Roland over a decade to get one even close. Yet due to his connections within the industry, Vanguard had their dedicated flatbed printer in less than half a year! Vanguard UV printer We do not have an evaluation on this new Vanguard model because that requires a visit to the demo test center, but FLAAR Reports keeps track of trends in the UV-cured printing industry. We also notice what factors cause a company to rise in prominence, and what factors will cause another company to begin to lose market share. To be polite we will not list the UV-printer brands which have dropped in popularity in recent years, and especially to be polite we do not list here the brands which will lose market share this winter and into 2016 due to recent changes. Innovative new brands help provide competition, and competition is beneficial both to factories and to end-users in print shops. 13

14 Textile Printers Since ITMA is the largest textile printer expo (outside of China), and since ITMA was a week after SGIA, although we (Maria Renee Ayau, our textile printer and ink evaluation manager) did take note of every textile aspect of SGIA, our coverage of textile printers is in our TRENDs series. Here are the front covers of these reports on textile aspects of wide-format. 14

15 DigiFab DigiFab is an experienced company, family owned and operated by individuals who know the textile printing world inside out for more than 15 years. I have visited their booth as early as the days of Encad. What I remember about their booth is that the color they achieved was always good. Now (for many years) they have become more international in coverage, so they often exhibit in Europe and Latin America. So there was also a nice DigiFab booth at ITMA the week after SGIA. DigiFab booth at Printing on fabric is not like printing on PVC or other signage substrates or graphics papers. So it definitely helps to have a RIP software which is from a company with a textile experience. Thus we feel you should consider looking at Evolution RIP Software from DigiFab. DigiFab textile printer 15

16 efi REGGIANI This is one of the first trade shows where efi REGGIANI was under this new name. It is definitely a good idea to maintain both names together. The week after SGIA we experienced an even larger efi REGGIANI booth at ITMA 2015 Milano (Italia), the largest textile expo outside of China. We look forward to learning more about efi REGGIANI printers and their benefits by being able to visit their world headquarters and demo room. Efi REGGIANI textile booth 16

17 Calendering Machines DigiHeat You can see the complete range of direct-to-fabric sublimation systems at APPPEXPO in Shanghai. You can see a wide range of calendering systems at ITMA (but that is every four years). To see samples, there were several brands at. We show here the DigiHeat in the booth of DigiFab. DigiFab DigiHeat calender 17

18 T-Shirt Printers You can see the complete range of direct-to-fabric sublimation systems at APPPEXPO in Shanghai. You can see a wide range of calendering systems at ITMA (but that is every four years). To see samples, there were several brands at. We show here the DigiHeat in the booth of DigiFab. 3D Sign Istanbul had an entire co-located 3D printer expo together with the normal sign and graphics aspect of Sign Istanbul. SIGGRAPH 2015 in Los Angeles this summer had an entire hall area full of 3D printers and 3D rapid prototypers. FESPA Africa 2015 had a good sample of 3D printers as well. Even Graphics of the Americas 2015 in Miami had some great 3D printers (even a wide range of different kinds of 3D printer technologies). I did not notice a 3D focus at SGIA. But this is a good example of how constructive critique can help, since with this statement, I bet they may consider adding 3D focus to SGIA Since the Hellmuth family background is architecture, I have been interested in 3D architectural models since college years. Plus of course now people keep asking me about 3D signage. Gilman leaf cutting sample The only 3D signage that I noticed was this nice exhibit. Remember, you do NOT need a 3D printer to produce 3D signage. We have an entire series of FLAAR Reports on what it takes to produce 3D signage. 18

19 To Improve the conditions in your print shop Every so often we receive an from a print shop owner whose Toshiba Tec printheads are failing. This is an expensive situation, since these failures are NOT backed up by any warranty (since the printer manufacturer blames all the head failure on the print shop). But finally Oce has faced the issue, and is now providing an (Island Clean Air Duster ) antidust air cleaner system along with every top-of-the-line Oce Arizona printer. In other words, the primary reason that finicky Toshiba Tec printheads fail seems to be dust in the air of the print shop. If you obtain a Duster from Island Clean Air, this seems to eliminate many of these printhead failures. So if you bought any printer with Toshiba Tec printheads, you should seriously consider acquiring a Duster unit from Island Clean Air. A set of printheads costs staggering amount of money more than the cost of a new Duster unit. We already have a Duster 2000 in one of our offices since even in a normal office there is lots of dust from the local environment. A Duster 3000 model would be recommended for a print shop environment, especially if you have any flatbed cutter or CNC router or CO2 laser engraver. These dust cleaning units were on exhibit at SGIA. If you missed their booth, you can contact them at: Larry Miller LRM Distribution Company lrmsales@telus.net Toll Free: Island Clean Air ICA booth 19

20 Screen printing Screen printing is alive and well at SGIA as well as at FESPA (Federation of European Screen Printer Associations, or something similar). What is nice is that the carcinogenic or otherwise toxic odor of screen ink is no longer an issue at SGIA. I can still remember 15 years ago the scrren printing ink chemicals in the expo hall gave you a headache within a few minutes. Solvent ink odor from full solvent inkjet printers also added to the chemical tsunami which hit visitors a decade ago. Now there are no full-solvent printers exhibited at most North American expos. Plus CO2 laser engravers are not as rough on people s noses as at expos in other countries. CO2 lasers on plastics are about as chemically offensive as screen printing or full solvent, with the additional issue of the sheer amount of particles: so more than just odor. Someone discretely said that there was a new SGIA policy about fumes, and that as a result some inkjet printers were not allowed to print. I had no way to document this whatsoever because the electricity was totally off the last day in several sections of the hall. Plus even on the first two days, one never expects all printers in all booths to actually be printing. So I do not know if the anti-fume regulation impacted litesolvent (also known as mild-solvent). Frankly CO2 laser engravers and some CNC routers (depending on what substance they are turning into smoke and particles) are more noticeable to your nose than mild-solvent printers. But what counts (if indeed there is a fume regulation which is new this year) is that SGIA is working towards keeping it healthy for attendees to visit the expo. It would be interesting to know which printer was prohibited from printing during the expo (if the tip I was told was true)? 20

21 MEMS printhead and one pass technology After 10 years of what people suggested was potentially MEMS technology patent farming in Australia, it was nice to see a company actually working on trying to produce a functional printer (rather than just harvesting endless patents to keep a technology private). But Memjet printhead technology had not advanced in the last four years (meaning the MEMS heads still can t take anything but dye ink, which could fade if outside or in a bright sunny room). Plus the heads constantly need to have the clogged nozzles cleaned (which means printing speed is zero). Xerox and Oce would exhibit their Memjet printers at one or two expos, then not exhibit them, then exhibit them again, then not exhibit them. Now Oce has a new model (which documents clearly the issues with the model of the last three years). When Memjet nozzles are not stuck, the output is gorgeous on coated stock. On uncoated paper, simple B&W architectural drawings are plenty good enough for architects and engineers (but photos do not look adequate unless on coated material). At Sign Istanbul several months ago the Memjet operator had issues with our files, and the file size which was generated clogged the system (so we printed these same files on an HP PageWide). At SGIA there was no access to print on the HP PageWide, so we took the files to the distributor of VORTEX with Memjet printheads and they kindly printed all the files. The Memjet output from the VORTEX on coated stock looks gorgeous. These Memjet systems are powered by Caldera RIP software. 21

22 Roll-fed Cutters The FOTOBA cutter is definitely my favorite. Plus the team in the COLEX FOTOBOA booth are hospitable and helpful in doing the cutting of my print evaluation samples (from the VORTEX Memjet printer). Fotoba booth 22

23 Fotoba cutter 23

24 Cutters It is always nice to see innovative equipment at a trade show. The person who showed us this equipment is Antonio Muratori. Someday we hope to visit their company in San Marino to learn more about this technology. 24

25 RIP Software When there is a Caldera booth, we tend to notice this. The energetic team of Caldera has really advanced their RIP into the high end, especially starting eight or so years ago. Caldera booth The teams of Onyx, ErgoSoft, and Wasatch are also energetic, as there is a lot of competition. 25 Onyx booth

26 MIS, Web-to-Print, and other Workflow Software Here are photographs of booths which offer printer and signage related software other than RIP and other than color management software. We do not evaluate any of them, since to evaluate would need to be at the headquarters demo room to obtain experience in-person. In the world of color management, most printer people know which is the high-end brand, and when is the entry-level and mid-range brand. The high-end brand flew us to their factory and world headquarters so we have personal experience with them. In the world of RIP software, most print shop managers know which is the high end brand, which is good, and popular, but not as industrial-strength as the high end brand; and which is a really good entry-level all the way into mid-range (Wasatch for example). There are also other RIP softwares which come from traditional sign making. I tend to prefer RIP software that is 100% from the world of wide-format inkjet. But for MIS and other software, every time a brand gets really well known and respected, then efi buys them for the efi VUTEk family of printers (which now includes Matan and REGGIANI). So (until I am physically at the demo room to be trained), I frankly do not know the total range of pros and cons of the brands of software outside of RIP. In the world of RIP software, the top industrial-strength brand already flew me to their world headquarters in France for training many years ago. But at least we can mention that SGIA had a good sample of software companies, keeping in mind that efi is a software RIP company and an MIS company and a printer manufacturer: this means that each of their components links and cooperates well with the other parts of an efi workflow (and now with an efi REGGIANI workflow). 26

27 Scanners Fifteen years ago, scanners were exhibited at most sign or printer expos. Today scanners are rarely exhibited (perhaps every two years at Photokina, but nowadays often not even there). Thus it was nice to see some healthy looking scanners at SGIA. Paradigm scanner booth 27

28 Accessories BBC is a company that I see every year. I have been to their factory in Missouri and know the owner. In addition to the products which they exhibit in their booth, if you need a factory in the USA to manufacturer accessories, you should speak with BBC. BBC screen printing drying booth 28

29 Distributors There were so many trends observable by analyzing the distributor booths at trade shows around the world that we have a special TRENDs level FLAAR Report on distributors at SGIA. Here we discuss the bizarre situation of Seiko printers, who have bounced from one distributor to another and now got sold lock-stock-and-barrel to a toner printer company. We also discuss the differences between an actual distributor and a factory distributor and a factory that falls on hard times and can no longer have its own booth so just has a small distributor offering what used to be in a major factory-brand-focused booth. In any industry some brands rise, some brands fall (and some brands collapse totally). Plus, some brands put on a good face (but behind the scenes things are very different). We wish all brands can be successful, since competing brands help nudge competitors to make better products and provide better service. But out in the real world the actual trends are very different. The rise and fall of several brands was very clearly evident at SGIA. Plus are different for each part of the world (which is why we keep track of what is happening at the leading printer expo in the Middle East (SGI, aka Sign Middle East, Dubai), what is happening in Turkey (Sign Istanbul, the longest-running sign expo in this part of the world) plus FESPA Africa and especially APPPEXPO in Shanghai (which has more brands of media and substrates than all other printer expos in the world; same with UV-cured printers: more brands at APPPEXPO 2015 in Shanghai than at every other printer expo put together). This is why five of us from FLAAR Reports will be flying to APPPEXPO 2016 in the remarkable and friendly city of Shanghai. It is crucial to know what is happening with inks, media, laminators, cutters, textile printers, UV-cured printers, solvent printers and everything else in China. So if you are a distributor, or manufacturer (or end-user at a print shop), we are always open to assisting you to keep track of what are the TRENDs around the world. 29

30 Trade Magazines Trade magazines are helpful for keeping track of what new products have been released. Plastics Magazine booth The battery of our new camera (for using at trade shows) turns out it lasts only about four hours at a trade show. So we regret that we do not have photos of all the trade magazine booths, but the extra battery that we ordered (an over-priced $30) will be waiting in our USA office to use at ITMA textile expo next week in Milano. Below is a list of those trade magazines which I noticed at SGIA. Added to the list should also be NMB, which publishes five trade magazines and seven reports. The magazine Sign & Digital Graphics is the best known (and one of the top three printer & signage magazines in North America). 30

31 Name of magazine booth Cygnus Business Media 5274 Digital Output Magazine 5009 Noticias Gran Formato Latin America 749 Plastics Decorating Magazine 945 POPSign Magazine 329 Sign Builder Illustrated 4845 SignIndustry.com 5046 SM Media Group 5330 Specialty Graphic Imaging Assn (SGIA has magazine also) 2913 ST Media Group International 2653 Stitches Magazine 430 UV+ EB Technology Magazine 945 Wearables Magazine 432 Educator Row Educator Row was a good idea, but not all booths were occupied the entire time by people to speak with anyone from the university. But having been a professor of wide-format inkjet printing (and digital photography and scanning) at several universities in the past, I definitely vote for having professors encouraged to attend printer expos. The snag in the US is that most printing education programs are screen printing, offset printing, or flexo printing, since these are the topics that the professors know. Outside of the UK there are not many universities who had in-depth wide-format courses or seminars on wide-format inkjet since there were no professors in these topics in the USA. Plus, since there were no professors, not many US students are doing a thesis or dissertation on wide-format inkjet, so there are not many younger instructors in this field either (this is why I was head of the section on wide-format inkjet where I was visiting research professor in past years at two universities, one in Guatemala, one in Ohio). But since I spend much of the year at sign printer, glass printer, textile printer, and ceramic tile printer expos, plus time in R&D labs in ink factories, printer factories, etc. it is tough for me to be on campus every day during the semester. So I focus on research out in the real world. 31

32 Suggestions for a good lightweight camera to use For professional photography in the past we have used Hasselblad and Leica in the 1960 s through 1990 s. In the digital era more Hasselblad + Phase One medium format backs. In the film era we used 4x5 Linhof and also an 8x10 Linhoff (National Geographic published photos by Nicholas already decades ago). But to show the booths of a trade show, a lightweight portable camera makes more sense than an 8x10! The new Sony camera we use has much better handling of bright lights. All the Canon point-and-shoot cameras burn-out the image if there is any bright light in the scene (we have tested several over the last several years and point-and-shoot Canon cameras are junk). We tried a Nikon point-and-shoot and stopped using it after two test sessions (not worth even writing a bad review about it). Downside with the Sony is not much close-up zoom capability. And the battery life is very low. Despite these two weak points, the 20 megapixel Sony DSC-RX100 M3 is by far the best of the last three years of easily portable cameras. We have over 50 years experience using photographic equipment: is our reference for cameras, lenses, studio lighting, etc. For regular photography we use a Canon EOS with 14mm, 17mm, 65mm 5x macro, 100mm macro, 180mm tele-macro, and 300mm prime lens. But our main camera is a 36 megapixel Nikon D810 camera with 15mm super-wide angle, 105mm macro, 200mm tele-macro, 400mm, and hope to acquire a 600mm lens for both bird and flower photography of Guatemala. You can see our photographs of plants and animals of Neotropical Central America on For a trade show it is not necessary to bring a camera which is as heavy as these DSLR models. 32

33 Booth Design, especially overhead booth logo displays Stratojet overhead banner I always enjoy seeing innovative booth designs, especially overhead brand displays (hanging from the ceiling). We provide FLAAR Reports on good booth design (and awful booth design). If your company has a full subscription, to any category (Textile reports, UV-cured reports, ink reports, media reports, etc) then we can provide our trade show booth design suggestions at no extra cost. 33

34 Here is an overhead booth logo display that cleverly utilizes both sides of the frame. Here is an example of an innovative booth design (the KIP booth). 34

35 Atlanta as a venue Hotels in Atlanta are grossly overpriced (though not as awful as hotels in Duesseldorf). We stayed in the cheapest chain hotel we could find and it was TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS A NIGHT. The room was so small I had to walk sideways past the end of the bed. Holiday Inn Express (breakfast was not exactly inspiring either, but not as totally inadequate as other hotels). Hotels in Shanghai, across from the former APPPEXPO trade show area, had yummy breakfasts, All you can eat, with hundreds of delicious foods to select from. Plus APPPEXPO has 200% more printers and about 400% more of all other aspects of wideformat printers than any printer or sign expo in North America. Cab fare from the airport is quite high (considering that the airport in Atlanta is not an excessive distance away (as is the Milan Malpensa airport)). But the primary issue with Atlanta as a venue is the street crime. Downtown is simply crime ridden. Every single person that I know who lives in Atlanta said that walking the streets of downtown (from expo center back to your hotel) is not safe (NOT EVEN if you are in a group of three to five people). There is no sense for exhibitors or attendees to have to put up with crime at this level. Plus, Atlanta is dull and boring (the Ferris wheel is sadly wimpy compared to the one I rode in Singapore). 35

36 But (trying to think of something positive to say), the skyline was a tad photogenic with two buildings in the background. I always try to think of something positive: for Atlanta since it is a hub, it is easy to find flights here. Plus the food court of the CNN center had lots of economical options for an evening meal. 36

37 A little bit about Atlanta Seven years have passed since the last time SGIA was held in Atlanta, a city full of history and prosperity, which has managed to grow from the ashes, to become one of the most prominent cities of Georgia. The history of Atlanta dates back to 1836, when Georgia decided to build a railroad to the U.S. Midwest and a location was chosen to be the line s Terminus. In 1839 homes and a store were built there and the settlement grew and it became known as Terminus, literally meaning end of the line. In 1842 the locals asked that the settlement of Terminus be called Lumpkin, after Governor Wilson Lumpkin; but governor Lumpkin instead asked them to name it after his young daughter, and Terminus became Marthasville. In 1845, the chief engineer of the Georgia Railroad, (J. Edgar Thomson) suggested that Marthasville be renamed Atlantica-Pacifica, which was quickly shortened to Atlanta. The town of Atlanta was incorporated in 1847 and in 1868; Atlanta became the Georgia state capital, taking over from Milledgeville. 37

38 SGIA as a trade show SGIA has improved significantly in the last several years. Attendance is demonstrably and noticeably more than any other trade show in USA or Canada. During the years that SGIA rose in popularity, Graph Expo has fallen dramatically in size (number of exhibits). SGIA does not clearly state whether there were fewer attendees in the unpopular city of Atlanta compared with last years in the definitely more popular Las Vegas or Orlando. But most exhibitors estimated that last year there may have been more attendees. Attendance was excellent on Day One; okay on Day Two; and noticeably fewer attendees most hours of Day Three. But what counts is that the attendees were serious potential buyers. And if a brand did well the first two days, the slow last day was not the end of the world. 38

39 Well Organized Aspects of SGIA Several FESPA expos have totally lacked bus shuttle service (some FESPA had nice bus shuttle service many past years ago). So SGIA did better than most world expos for bus shuttle service. 39

40 SGIA even had excellent bus shuttle service the last set-up day (day before expo opens). It is unprecedented for other expos to have shuttles the day before the expo even opens. I prefer exercise, so I walked back and forth, but the bus service definitely documents that SGIA team did a good job with this aspect. There were actually carpets the full width of the aisles. I mention this since Photokina already several years ago stopped using carpets in at least one of their halls. By 2014 Photokina had even fewer carpets (a few of the big-brand halls still had carpets). Other expos have only a carpet down the middle of the aisle, so a meter on each side are raw concrete floor (but at least this is better than no carpet at all). Lack of carpets (showing only the rough concrete floor) is cheap, shoddy, and tough on your feet when you have to hike many kilometers every day over these floors. 40 SGIA view

41 Atlanta Convention Center Buildings You had to hike about one kilometer (seemed close to a mile) to get from the outside into where the expo was actually held THREE FLOORS DOWN IN THE BASEMENT. Plus it was confusing why the expo was in one building and the check-in (badge retrieval) was in a totally other hall (which was great for exercise, the distance of another football field, before hiking two football fields to the actual trade show location). 41

42 I love healthy exercise but the distances verged on the unrealistic. Expo Hall, was easy to find each aisle A Hall which is round, or odd-shaped (L-shaped especially) is very hard to keep track of what aisle is where. The benefit of the Atlanta expo center was that everything was in one continuous hall (even if actually it was several adjoining halls). So it was easy to keep track of Row 1 to 54 (Aisle 100 to 5400). Many people complained over the 54 hall length which was caused by narrowness of the hall, but I had no issues of 54 halls (although I sure had to hike many kilometers when I had meetings in Aisle 1700 and I was in Hall 5100). But it sure is easier to have everything in one continuous system rather than having an L-shaped all (these are the absolute worst). 42

43 Exhibitor Director and Maps were nice SGIA had a nice set of maps and exhibitor lists. 43

44 I always appreciate booths with Teddy Bears or T-shirts We bring back to the office Teddy Bears and T-Shirts for the staff, thus we definitely appreciate booths with Teddy Bears or T-shirts. 44

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