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This is the first of a series of articles by Dave Dennings that we undertook to bring you on a weekly basis. We are not going to repeat Dave’s impressive credentials each time but we recommend that if you do not know Dave, you review our introductory blog here: http://www.insidescreenprinting.com/dave-dennings/ The Dennings article that we are bringing . . . → Read More: Dave Denning on pinholes. Let’s be frank. Nothing really new, exciting and innovative has come out of the supply side of this industry for quite some time. And with all due respect to the ink manufacturers, we don’t mean exciting in a look!-we-are-saving-the-planet-with-our-eco-friendly-inks kind of way. We mean in a wow!-what-a-great-idea-that-works-and-costs-less kind of way. Just when we thought that emulsion is a commodity and . . . → Read More: What is not to love about this innovative emulsion that costs less? We have just had an email from a customer (who is also a big PolyWhite fan) in response to the Canada Goose / PolyWhite blog item. He points out that what we should have said was that migrating dye can cause more crap than even a Canada . . . → Read More: Screen printing wit… As most screen printers know (and have probably experienced) it is something that is more certain to migrate than even a Canada goose; it is the dye in Polyester. It is often referred to as ‘bleeding’, but whatever you choose to call it, the result is the same; a discoloured print. And, as most printers know, the best solution on . . . → Read More: It is not a Canada Goose, but it will almost always migrate. What is it? Screenflex started doing it 23 years ago and today it is still being done every day in the Cambridge ink laboratory and then being shipped to textile screen printers everywhere. We are referring of course to colour matching and mixing; everything from custom colour matches to all the PANTONE colours. Matches can be made to anything from samples of any other . . . → Read More: Any colour in any type of plastisol ink! An orange from Brooklyn, New York? Certainly! It is not the first creative concept to come out of Ulano in recent years - as far as we know they are still the only manufacturer that delivers their emulsion and chemicals in red containers instead of the industry standard containers, boring black or wish-washy white. Have you ever wondered why, in a creative and colourful industry . . . → Read More: An orange from Brooklyn, New York! The flag on this t-shirt did not start out as a distressed print; it went that way after only about a dozen washes. The t-shirt was bought at a Toronto airport store last year for Canada Day. After examining the print as it deteriorated after each wash, we concluded that the problem was bad white ink and possibly less-than-excellent printing. For anyone who cares . . . → Read More: Cheap ink and shoddy workmanship. Who printed it? PolyOne (Wilflex) recently sent out an email advising their distributors that they were going to be required to take a training program about compliance with anti-bribery and anti-corruption laws. The focus is apparently going to be the U.S Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The email also mentions “maintaining ethical business standards”, which is something we at Screenflex have been advocating for our . . . → Read More: PolyOne (Wilflex) takes aim at bribery and corruption. Most exhibitors reported that they were encouraged by the attendance. We have not seen any official attendance numbers but it certainly seemed to be a busy show this year. That will be good news for the industry and may be a reason for optimism, particularly in the U.S. It remains to be seen whether it indicates the same for the Canadian textile . . . → Read More: Show report… Long Beach ISS 2012. So far our survey has not detected much interest among Candian screen printers in attending the Long Beach show on the 20th, 21st and 22nd of this month. Various reasons have been mentioned but the most common to date is cost. We have often pointed out that, in our opinion, the Long Beach show is the premier textile screen printing show in North . . . → Read More: Preliminary survey reveals not much Canadian interest in Long Beach show So what does this dog and his veterinarian have to do with screen printing? Well, not a whole lot except that Ryley has been one of Screenflex’s beloved mascots for the past 16 years. So there is just enough of a connection to provide us with an excuse to tell an interesting tale about how some businesses . . . → Read More: How many t-shirts equal a vet’s bill?
By now you might have experienced the sharp rise in stencil remover prices. And if you have been told that most of it is due to the Japanese earthquake and tsunami of March this year, that would be correct. But it is also apparently due to short supplies in Chile which is the world’s major supplier of iodine. The key ingredient . . . → Read More: What is happening to stencil remover prices? With the busy summer season behind us and long Canadian snowy nights to look forward to, it’s that time again for a log on the fire and a blog on the computer. We know that, generally speaking, the recovery in the textile screen printing industry in Canada has a way to go yet, but we hope that if you didn’t have a great summer . . . → Read More: Back and blogging again! We have been mentioning for some time that the price of products such as white paint, white ink etc. that have as their core pigment Titanium Dioxide, have all been going up in price due to the world-wide shortage of that pigment. The impact of the shortage is not quite as bad as the impact of . . . → Read More: White ink price increase.
Here is the seventh extract from Rafi Mohammed’s book, The Art of Pricing. From the chapter, Differential Pricing, he tells an interesting tale to make us carefully consider why we might sometimes offer “quantity” discounts… “… there are many justifications for quantity discounts. My only caution is that you should understand why you are granting a discount. . . . → Read More: “The Art of Pricing” – weekly extract number 7 (The dicounted ribs) You might be planning to attend the screen printing shows later in the year or you may be off on a summer vacation soon. In either case, if the trip involves staying in hotels, here is something that you should consider. It came to us as an email and, while we generally ignore emails of this . . . → Read More: Planning to travel to the screen printing shows this year?
Credit: Image by Peter Wynn Thompson for the New York Times. The New York Times recently offered this case study (Author: Adriana Gardella) which should be of interest to Canadian textile screen printers. The NYT published this one week and then followed up the next week with reaction and comments from other business . . . → Read More: Was Big D wise to pursue small customers? A case study from the NYT about a textile screen printer. This is the sixth week of referencing extracts from Rafi Mohammed’s book, The Art of Pricing. From the chapter, It’s All About Value, he uses the example of the fluctuating value of umbrellas sold by street vendors in major U.S. cities like Washington DC to make the point that pricing should be based on the value . . . → Read More: “The Art of Pricing” – weekly extract number 6 (The Fluctuating Value of an Umbrella) Last November we reported on this blog that a world-wide shortage of Titanium Dioxide (the key ingredient in white pigments and ink) was having an impact on white ink prices. While a number of suppliers increased their white prices, Screenflex managed to hold the Wilflex white ink prices steady until now. Unfortunately though, Wilflex has announced an increase in . . . → Read More: Titanium Dioxide shortages push white ink prices up. We have on occasion addressed the topic of sensitivity to what sometimes appears on t-shirts and how it can come back to haunt and possibly ruin a textile screen printer. The latest case involves swimsuits produced in Australia using the image of a Hindu goddess. The lesson to be learnt from these incidents is that if you . . . → Read More: Religious sensitivities and textile printing. This is the fifth week of referencing extracts from Rafi Mohammed’s book, The Art of Pricing. This time the topic is market share. In North America (and particularly our neighbours to the south) it is almost taken as a given that a business can only be successful if it grows, and the faster the better. Unfortunately, . . . → Read More: “The Art of Pricing” – weekly extract number 5 Now that the warmer summer weather seems to have arrived in Canada at last, it is soon going to be hot, hot, hot in textile screen shops all over the country. And what do some shops do to cool things down a bit? They open a door or two or a window or two to get . . . → Read More: Hot in the shop? Watch those cooling drafts! This is the fourth week of referencing extracts from Rafi Mohammed’s book, The Art of Pricing. The topic is a very common (but bad) reason for making pricing concessions; customer goodwill. “Another faulty idea is the notion of goodwill, one of the most overrated words in pricing. Managers often try to justify questionable price cuts with the belief that . . . → Read More: “The Art of Pricing” – weekly extract number 4.
CTV is reporting that “Environment Canada says we could be in for a warmer-than-normal summer across the country. Senior climatologist David Phillips says preliminary forecasts indicate June, July and August will be warmer than normal from coast to coast” Okay, since warm weather is t-shirt weather, let’s hope that the man . . . → Read More: Encouraging news… Distractions like the election and the brutal winter, are over. Would it be too much to ask that you now get out and do your patriotic duty by helping to get the economy moving? Here’s a great idea… how about hitting the mall for a few . . . → Read More: Dear distracted Canadian public…
We have addressed the issue of suspected scam emails directed at our industry before. Having received these recently though, just minutes apart, we thought that it was time to post a reminder that if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it is probably a duck. First one… “Hello This is . . . → Read More: More scam emails directed at our industry? This is the third week of referencing extracts from Rafi Mohammed’s book, The Art of Pricing. The point this week is that transactions are two-way streets; something we often overlook when pricing. “While the common convention is that sellers should be grateful to customers, it’s important to remember that transactions are two-way streets. The point that I . . . → Read More: “The Art of Pricing” – weekly extract number 3. Ink remover is not a hand cleaner! That includes ink washes and on-press cleaners. We don’t care how “safe” some manufacturers claim their ink removers are or whether they are soy-based or solvent-based, it is not smart to use them for cleaning human skin. We recently had an inquiry from a printer who wanted to replace the . . . → Read More: Ink remover is not a hand cleaner! This is the second week of referencing extracts from Rafi Mohammed’s book, The Art of Pricing. Last week we quoted a passage about how, in situations where margins are razor-thin (such as in much of the Canadian textile screen printing industry), raising prices just 1% could improve the bottom line by 11%. This week we are . . . → Read More: “The Art of Pricing” – weekly extract number 2. It was announced late last week that Weston Presidio had sold its controlling interest in Toronto-based Trimark Sportswear Group to Polyconcept North America. Trimark was founded in 1975 in Markham, Ontario. Polyconcept is a U.S.-based manufacturer of promotional products such as stationery, travel accessories, planners and appointment books. There has been no indication yet as to whether . . . → Read More: Controlling interest in Trimark sold. |
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