As we are all painfully aware, Canadian textile screen printing has been hurt badly in recent years by cheap offshore producers in low-wage regimes with poor human rights records and little or no pollution control regulations. In fact, there is hardly a sector of our economy that has not been affected.

That is why we wanted to share with you the above graphic sent to us by a Californian associate. Apparently the people of San Rafael, California have been pushing back; perhaps it is time for screen printers from B.C to P.E.I and every place in between to push back as well.

Only buying Canadian-produced and Canadian screen-printed garments, and encouraging your family and friends to do the same, would be a good start. It is not easy to convince people to pay a bit more to help support Canadian jobs and businesses, but we have to try and we have to start somewhere.

Is there a screen printer anywhere that hasn’t at some point had to deal with a difficult, complaining customer? Zig Ziglar claims that it actually represents an opportunity. We guess that he is saying that when you are handed a lemon it is an opportunty to make lemonade. Remember when Tylenol had that tampering incident that could have ruined the brand? Well, they turned it around and made lemonade out of a lemon by admitting to the problem, fixing it and then making sure that everyone knew that they had fixed it.

Ziglar says: “Statistics suggest that when customers complain, business owners and managers ought to get excited about it. The complaining customer represents a huge opportunity for more business.”

“In the end, the customer doesn’t know, or care, if you are small or large as an organization.. she or he only focuses on the garment hanging on the rail in the store.”

You might have noticed that the Screenflex.ca online service was down for a week. We took it down for a major programming upgrade which (naturally) took longer than we had anticipated. Good news though is that it is up and fully functional again with greater speed and with the security upgraded to the best available.

If you have any suggestions for further improvements to the site, we would love to hear from you. Just click on “contact us” and use the email facility.

It is winter in Canada again and therefore time for our annual reminder that certain screen printing supplies can be ruined by freezing. At this time of the year labels something like the one above, should be taken seriously.

Emulsion has traditionally been the biggest problem in the Canadian winters both in shipping and storage. Although it is true that the smaller the container the quicker it will freeze, the size of the container is no protection. We once took delivery of two 55 gallon drums of frozen emulsion after a truck’s heating system failed. With the lids off they looked like two giant pink ice lollies. Once that happens the emulsion is ruined because when it thaws the various ingredients separate and no amount of stirring will fix it.

The other vulnerable products are water-based inks, blockouts and anything else water-based. So, take the “do not freeze” labels seriously from now until at least March.

A world-wide shortage of a key ingredient in white pigment and white ink, Titanium Dioxide (TiO2) is having an impact on white ink prices.  

Apparently TiO2 production has been lagging behind demand for at least the past year. That means that the price of TiO2 has shot up and that in turn means that any product made with TiO2 has increased in price. In our industry that includes white pigments and anything made with white pigments, such as white ink. So far this year it has amounted to about a 10% increase in white pigments and white ink prices. In a lesser way, it has also had an impact on any ink for which the formula includes white pigment.

According to one source, 70% of all pigments are made using at least some TiO2 and unfortunately currently there is no viable substitute.

As an aside, even though it’s not likely to make you feel any better about the TiO2 situation,  it might interest you to know that white screen printing ink shares its main ingredient with some other products that we see and/or handle every day.While we were investigating the TiO2 shortage and its impact on our industry, we found out that Titanium Dioxide is also used in toothpaste, dental bleaching materials, house paint, road markings, skimmed milk, sunscreen and food colouring, to name just a few.  

Back to our industry though… we’ll keep an eye on the TiO2 situation and post any new information here.

The “crisis”:

Floods and/or droughts in cotton-growing countries such as China, Pakistan and India are given as the main reasons for what is being called the world-wide “cotton crisis”. For Canadian textile screen printers it means that there are delays in deliveries of t-shirts and that the price of a t-shirt is going up. And the really bad news is that we can’t find anyone with a reliable opinion about when the “cotton crisis” is going to be over – it could be a long time.

We asked:

So, what can be done by t-shirt printers to work around the problem? We asked some of our industry contacts in high places around the world how pinters and their customers are coping.

We were told:

The standard answer was that most of the brands and their printers are switching to poly or poly blend garments. But of course, as we all know, dyed poly and poly blend garments present dye migration (“bleeding”) issues. However, as we also know, we now have excellent dye-block whites (such as Poly White) that can be used as an under-base white on dyed poly and poly blends. Many printers do that, flash, and then print regular plastisol ink on the the Poly White. There are also inks (MVP series) designed for athletic poly.

Need some help?:

If you have any questions, concerns, or ideas about the “cotton crisis” we would like to hear from you. Just drop us an email at info@screenflex.ca and we’ll do what we can to help you.

Once in a while a manufacturer will surprise us with a really great idea with a really great price tag. This time it is ULANO with their EZ-FILM.

Okay, we know that we would have called it something else in Canada (we say “zed” and the Americans say “zee”) but just this once let’s indulge them and go with the “EE-ZEE” thing because it really does describe this product which is “easy” to use and “easy” on the budget too. In any case, ”EE-ZED FILM” would just be wrong; like if they had won the hockey gold medal – it would just be wrong.

This film is ideal for mesh counts of 110 to 156. We recommend it for use with standard textile plastisol inks. It is not recommended for water-based inks.

Here’s a quick list of why coating a screen with EZ-FILM is a great alternative to liquid emulsion: it is fast exposing; it dries faster than emulsion; it needs very little training to do; you get perfect stencils every time; you get consistent stencil thickness; you have fewer pinholes; it is convenient; there is no mess or waste; and the trasparent magenta colour allows for easy inspection and registration. So, what can you lose by giving EZ-FILM a test? Call us for a free sample pack of 5 sheets.

 Screenflex stocks EZ-FILM in packs of 50 sheets in two sizes, 15″ x 17″ and 17″ x 24″.  You can buy it and find detailed product infomation at www.screenflex.ca or call Screenflex at 1 800 661 7766 or email info@screenflex.ca  And remember that we have 5-sheet sample packs in the 15″ x 17″ size for testing for just $1.00.

This is a “good news / bad news” story.

Oh yes, we all know that the Canadian textile screen printing industry needs all the help that it can get right now but, unfortunately, some manufacturers have indicated that they still have to put up their prices. Apparently there have been raw material price increases that have to be passed on. The exception is Ulano who have chosen to not pass on an increase – see the next story.

Wilflex (still the manufacturer of the best screen printing ink in the world) has indicated in a letter to its distributors that 2009 was a tough year. They say that as a result of managing costs through their “Lean Six Sigma” initiative they don’t have to increase the prices of their newer environmental range of inks but they do have to increase the prices of their Classic Inks by about 5%. That is the bad news part of this story.

The good news part of this story is that Screenflex is going to absorb the price increase and NOT PASS IT ON to our Canadian Wilflex customers. In addition to the continuing strong support from our customers, there are two reasons that we can do this. After our Western Canadian sale we undertook a reorganization and belt-tightening that resulted in some cost savings, and the stronger Canadian dollar has helped a bit as well.

Our dollar looks good for now and we will continue to manage our costs carefully even as we increase our sales base. Unless anything significant changes, we should be able to hold the prices down for some time yet.   

 If you have any comments about this story specifically, prices in general, or anything else for that matter, I invite you to drop me an email at michael.best@screenflex.ca  or call 1 800 661 7766 and let’s chat.

Finally some good news out of the U.S. for Canadian screen printers! A letter from Ulano to its distributors dated January 18th, 2010 and signed by Gary Gayton is interesting for the fact that it is not a usual manufacturer’s annual sorry-but-we-have-no-choice-but-to-increase-prices whine.

Quoting from the first paragraph…

“As Al Guercio mentions in his column in the January issue of the Ulano Worldwide Distributor Report, our sales – your purchases from us – have been on the rebound for some months now. No one can be sure we’re out of the recessionary woods yet and there are continuing risks of higher energy and chemical costs, inflation, and devaluation of the US Dollar. Nevertheless, we have decided not  to increase prices at this time. We think this is supportive of you and our mutual customers in what is still a difficult, uncertain economy.”

Notice…  Ulano has decided to NOT increase prices.

Screenflex applauds this news. Finally somebody seems to appreciate what the surviving textile screen printers have been enduring lately, particularly those on this side of the border.

We have lost a business associate and a friend. It is with sadness that we report that Nick Kondrats of Tekmar in Santa Barbara passed away last Wednesday the 13 th of January, 2010.

Nick, seen here on the right of the picture, finally succumbed to the cancer  that he had been fighting for some time.

There are some people who, when they die, leave you wishing that you had had the opportunity to spend more time with them. Nick was such a person. I don’t know anyone who knew him who would not say that he was one of the kindest, most gentle, most caring, unselfish people that you could hope to meet.

Even if you had hardly known Nick at all and  had only spoken to him for a few moments at say the Tekmar booth at the Long Beach Show, you would know what I mean. You would have been aware of it immediately. Chances are that if you had bought one of Tekmar’s spray adhesive applicators from him, you would have walked away with a couple of free gallons of adhesive for no other reason than that was just how Nick was. It might have driven his business partners crazy on occasion but that never deterred Nick from being Nick.

It has often been said that how someone relates to animals tells you a lot about their nature. I know of at least a few dogs and even a rescued bird or two who, if they could talk, could give us first hand accounts of Nick’s gentle, caring nature. I could add to their accounts by telling how once we knew that he had cancer, I would call to see how he was doing and he would instead want to know how I was coping with my cold. When he could have been preoccupied with his own health issues, he instead worried and cared about others. And he did so to the end.

We will remember Nick fondly. One of Margaret’s memories will always be how she and Nick made a point of  getting together for oysters each year in Long Beach. For me, the above picture of a business meeting with Nick, Jim and Simon in Santa Barbara will always be an example of how business should be conducted – relaxed and casual, just the way Nick lived. If the rest of us are smart, we will let him be a lasting reminder to us that life is too short for it to be lived any other way.

Jim and Simon will carry on running Tekmar in Santa Barbara, Screenflex will continue selling Tekmar products in Canada, we will all continue to meet up at the Long Beach show once a year, oysters will continue to be eaten, and jokes will continue to be exchanged by email. But none of it will be the same without Nick.

As the 2010 Winter Games approach, it is time to resurrect this article first published in 2008…

Kathleen salutes our Beijing Olympians and their 18 medals in her official Canadian Olympic Team t-shirt. She also looks forward to great results from our winter Olympians with her official Vancouver 2010 sun visa.

Canadian gear! Canadian pride! Made in China?

We know that others have been objecting publicly about Canadian Olympic apparel being produced abroad, but we want to take up the cause on behalf of our industry specifically.

Canadian pride is important, but so are Canadian jobs, in this case, screen printing jobs. Why can’t we tie the two together? Why can’t the Canadian Olympic Committees show some of the patriotism that they expect the rest of us to show? Why don’t they insist that all Canadian Olympic licensed gear has to be produced in Canada? We have textile manufacturing and textile screen printing industries decimated by an exodus of work to low-wage destinations abroad. It takes a special kind of gall to ask an unemployed Canadian textile worker or a failed screen shop owner to proudly wear a Maple Leaf sewn and printed in China!

Canadians don’t seem to realize that Canadian jobs and Canadian businesses are being destroyed by their greedy clamour for cheap products made by foreign workers in foreign countries. When that greed overshadows even national pride, it has gone too far. 

How about this for a suggestion to deal with out misplaced priorities problem? Before our athletes get a boost from any of the additional tax payers’ money that they want in order to produce more medals and boost national pride, let’s give the tax payers a boost by stopping the flow of Olympic textile and screen printing jobs to offshore locations. Let’s rethink Canadian national pride a bit and let’s keep more of its economic benefits inside Canada.

And don’t bother pointing out that Kathleen is wearing Canadian pride made in China. She’s a dummy. What’s your excuse?

Effective today (1st September 2009), Screenflex ‘s Western Canadian operation has been acquired by Stanley’s Sign and Screen Supply.

Stanley’s Calgary office will continue to serve printers in Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia and the Territories with exactly the same range of products and services that Screenflex provided as well as products and equipment that Screenflex did not carry. Wendy Wenzel has moved over to Stanley’s to manage the business acquired from Screenflex. Printers will therefore be assured of a relatively seamless transition and will still have access to Wendy’s friendly and knowledgeable assistance. Stanley’s Calgary office can be called toll free at 1 800 661 1553 or at 403 243 7722. Wendy can be emailed at wendy@stanleyssignsupply.com

Screenflex will now focus on Central and Eastern Canada (from Manitoba east) from our office and warehouse in Cambridge, Ontario. All contact information for Screenflex remains unchanged. The toll-free number is still 1 800 661 7766 and the email contact is info@screenflex.ca

The Bests want to thank Western Canadian printers for not only their business over the past 21 years but also for the many memories, the laughs and the friendships. At the same time though we remember with fondness the staff and customers who, for one reason or another, passed away during the past two decades.

So, after 21 years in Calgary, Screenflex has left the building…

You are a good parent. You have booked your kid in for scuba diving lessons. You have put out big bucks for a really cool wet suit with a neat little screen-printed logo. But you are also a concerned and safety-conscious parent so you have made sure that the logo was screen printed with ink certified to be lead free, that is, less than 100 parts of lead per million.

Now your kid is ready to dive fully protected from the possibility of being poisoned by any lead in the little screen-printed logo on the suit. So strap on the 20 lb lead weight diving belt on your child and let’s go!

Whaaat?!!

Exactly!

One has to ask. Has this legislation been thought through properly?

Thanks to the customer who brought this example to our attention today. His company manufactures wet suits in three places around the globe. It seems that he now has to go to a lot of trouble and expense to switch to lead-free and phthalate-free ink and to have the prints on children’s wet suits certified by an independent accredited laboratory. He quite rightly wonders by what reasoning the 20 lb lead weight belt is exempt. If you have any similar examples, email me at michael.best@screenflex.ca  We might as well get a bit of a laugh out of this, even as we are being forced to comply.

At the moment this is a U.S. issue that only affects Canadian producers of imprinted childrens’ garments destined for the U.S. But as we all know, sooner or later, what happens in the U.S. in our industry will cross the border and happen in Canada as well. Therefore, all Canadian textile screen printers need to pay attention to this issue.

Our industry sources in the U.S. tell us that as of February 10th 2009, printers of childrens’ apparel for the U.S. market are going to have to produce certification that the ink used in every delivery contains less than 100 PPM (parts per million) of lead.

One might assume that users of Wilflex ink could merely point out that it has been free of lead for about 30 years…  so what’s the problem? But apparently, in terms of the new legislation in the U.S., that is not good enough. Certification of the print has to be done by an accredited laboratory, of which there are apparently only 4 or 5 in the entire country. We understand that the cost of certifying a print “lead free” is about $300.00. This is bound to cause irritation. We have already heard of a case where a fist fight almost developed because a printer refused to certify a print on the grounds that the deadline of 10th February had not yet arrived, and the customer refused to take delivery because he would be selling the garments after the deadline at which the law would come into effect.

And furthermore, lead is not the only sticking point in the pursuit of “safe” imprinted garments. Phthalate (pronounced “thalate”) is also black listed now as bad for the health of American children. Phthalate is the component of regular plastisol and some water-based inks that gives them flexibility. Ironically, I.V. pouches and blood storage pouches as well as a multitude of other medical supplies are made flexible with Phthalates.

The Europeans were the first to focus on making textile products Phthalate-free. The U.S.A. followed suit by setting February 2009 as the deadline, however, we have just been told that that deadline might be pushed out quite a bit. Apparently, among other issues, it has been realized that strict enforcement will put most, if not all, of the used clothing retailers and charities out of business.

Regardless of whether there is going to be a deferment of the deadline or not, certain large sporting goods and childrens’ wear suppliers are requiring certification from printers as if the legislation were already in place. There are also have a number of Canadian printers who are protecting their global childrens’ wear business by not waiting to be forced into compliance. They are preparing to switch to Wilflex’s Phthalate-free Epic line of inks.

Wilflex’s Epic Phthalate-free colours have been available for about 5 years. More recently a full range of bases, pigments, and specialty inks like Fashion Soft Base, gels, metallics and High Density Clear have been added as well.

As with all new and far-reaching developments and legislation there can be confusion, misunderstanding and misinformation in the beginning. We will keep an eye on this issue and produce updates and clarifications right here in this newsletter as they become available. In the meantime, if you need more information or technical assistance, call Screenflex toll-free at 1-800-661-7766 or email info@screenflex.ca

If you are going to attend the upcoming Long Beach Show, be sure to visit the Wilflex booth and quiz the experts about this topic.

With U.S.-sourced screen printing products escalating in price due to the sudden increase in the cost of a U.S. dollar, and ink being no exception, our focus has been turned back to ink cost efficiency.

First of all though, before we look at ink costs, printers should keep in mind that they have much bigger cost issues brought on by the decline in the value of the Canadian dollar. Garments, equipment and other imported items should be receiving much more attention than the pennies per print that ink represents.

But since at Screenflex our focus is ink, we want to remind you that there are measures you can take to reduce the volume of ink that you apply to garments and in so doing, reduce your ink costs. Don’t overlook the obvious; it always amazes us how often this happens. Here are some important cost-saving measures: proper selection of mesh; proper mesh tension; proper squeegee selection; and appropriate equipment settings.

Just to illustrate what a difference mesh selection can make to ink cost, look at these results that we produced using Wilflex’s Ink Management System (IMS). We entered all the variables to determine the cost per print (ink type, print size, % coverage, mesh count). We did our comparison by changing just one variable, the mesh count.

When we went from a 110 mesh to a 158 mesh we cut our ink cost by 37%. Then when we moved up to a 196 mesh we cut it by a further 15%. We moved up to 230 mesh and cut the per-print ink cost by another 25%. Our model showed that the ink cost using 110 mesh was more than twice as much as the ink cost when using 230 mesh.

Even though, in the end, the ink cost is mere pennies per print, it is worth considering your mesh counts and using higher counts wherever possible. Aside from the ink saving, your prints will be softer, which is very “in” right now.

And what exactly do we mean by pennies-per-print? Well, in our model we assumed a solid 12 inch by 12 inch print covered 100%. And the cost in the worst case using 110 mesh was just over 10 cents per print which we brought down to just over 4 cents per print using the 230 mesh. Oh, and the pricing? That was at the latest prices adjusted upwards for the latest exchange rates.

Screenflex cannot do anything for you with regard to the international money market and the cost of a U.S. dollar. But we can bring you quality products, efficient friendly service and competent technical support; all at just pennies per print.

Some ink manufacturers have just woken up to the fact that governments and customers are beginning to focus on eco-friendly screen printing ink. Now they are announcing eco-friendly ink like they have just invented something new. But as with most new developments in textile screen printing inks, Wilflex is still way ahead of the game, just as they were when they were the first to take lead out of plastisol ink 25 years ago. 

Kathleen’s t-shirt is printed with eco-friendly Wilflex ink that has been available for eight years all over the world!

Wilflex Quantum One does not include phthalates or PVC resin, yet it prints and cures like conventional palstisol-based inks. It also delivers the same high-quality performance and PANTONE colours you would expect from other Wilflex colour systems.

Wilflex Oasis is a line of water-based inks that does not include phthalates, PVC or AEPO’s and it meets the Oeko Tex 100 standard. The Oasis line also includes non-formaldehyde discharge inks.

Wilflex Epic ink system provides you with the most advanced non-phthalate ink technology for market conditions and certification standards that require non-phthalate inks. The Epic system is based on Wilflex’s popular MX mixing system that gives you consistent PANTONE colours.

Want to know more about eco-friendly inks? Don’t waste time with immitators and be careful of salespeople who claim to have “organic”, “green” or “enviro” inks without knowing what they are talking about. Don’t be some no-name brand’s guinea pig, call Screenflex toll-free at 1-800-661-7766 or email us at info@screenflex.ca We know a lot, but if you manage to stump us, we always have the full resources of Wilflex’s experts to back us up.

Oh, one more thing…   we have samples.