POV "New Product" Advisory: Drytac Introduces Flexible UV Curable Liquid Coating

Drytac®, a leader in liquid coating technology, has a new UV curable clear coat for use on applications requiring maximum flexibility.

InstaCure SuperFlex is a high gloss coating flexible enough to form around rivets and stretch into compound and complex curves. It is also thermo-formable.

Tests show that InstaCure SuperFlex has the ability to stretch up to six times its original size, allowing manufacturers of fleet and vehicle graphics to benefit from the low cost and high speed applications made possible with high UV curable liquid coaters.

INSTACure SuperFlex contains a proprietary blend of acrylate and non yellowing urethane UV curable polymers to give coated prints flexibility. The coating develops a tough exterior finish that is scratch and abrasion resistant and able to withstand the rigors of commercial truck washes using standard commercial cleaners.

“With coating costs as low as 6 cents per square foot and speeds of up to 60 linear feet per minute with our new roll to roll attachment, customers can now not only compete, but for the first time in a long time, make significant profits in this industry with this product application," says Jim Tatum, Drytac’s liquid finishing division manager.

Something to consider if you do auto wraps!


The PEiR Group

HP Says It's Time To Trade Up!

Take advantage of select HP Designjet printers and get cash back!

With the HP Designjet Cash In & Trade Up promotion, you can get up to $2,500 cash back* when you upgrade your eligible old product and purchase or lease an HP Designjet Z6100 or Z3200 series printer and submit the online claim form by October 23, 2009.

You have the option of keeping or trading in your eligible old HP or non-HP large-format product—you just need to show proof that you currently own one. The promotion runs August 1, 2009 through October 23, 2009.

Plus, you can save up to $200 when you add a qualifying HP Care Pack Service, which will help reduce unexpected repair costs and downtime.


*U.S. residents only. Cash back provided by mail-in rebate available for eligible purchases made August 1, 2009–October 23, 2009. Additional restrictions apply. Void where prohibited, taxed or restricted by law.
For qualifying product options, terms and conditions, and claim form, visit www.hp.com/go/cashin4.

Canon Offers Link For FREE Exhibits-Only Pass To Print '09

"Freebie" Notice!

Here's a link for all PEiR Group members interested in attending Print '09 in Chicago - and who would like FREE access to the exhibits during the show, courtesy of Canon.

Click HERE for your free Exhibits-Only pass to the show, Sept. 11-16.

All badges will be mailed directly to the customer if they register prior to August 14. Badges cannot be picked up on-site unless the actual person is present.

The cutoff for FREE registration is August 26.

HP Invites PEiR Members To See Their NEW Latex Printer At Print '09

Message from Shaun to all PEiR members:

Frank Marzigliano, our HP representative, has extended an invitation to all PEiR members interested in getting an early look at HP's new Latex printer at Print '09 in Chicago.

Frank has booked a special meeting room for the informal demo on September 14th from 3 to 4 p.m. CST.

This is cutting-edge stuff. Here's the agenda:

• Demo (40 minutes)
• Company overview & sign non-disclosure (5 minutes)
• Overview of HP Signage portfolio (5 minutes)
• Latex technology (5 minutes)
• Demonstration (15 minutes)
• Key applications & media portfolio (10 minutes)

The official public announcement of the Latex machine will be at SGIA in New Orleans in early October, according to Frank. Print 'O9 would be a great early opportunity for us all to watch them put the machine through its paces.

If you're interested drop me an email and I'll make it happen. Should be fun.


Regards,

Shaun

Signs Of Life And Recovery Around The Global Marketplace - How Are Things In Your Neck Of The Woods?

The PEiR Group

There may still be a long road ahead of us as some have said, but recent developments have given rise to hope that the nation is about to emerge from the worst recession since World War II.

“Recession is over, economy is recovering – let’s look forward and stop the backward-looking focus,” John E. Silvia, the Wells Fargo chief economist, wrote Tuesday.

“We’ve found the bottom,” says Mark Fleming, chief economist for First American CoreLogic, a data firm monitoring housing starts and sales.

Perhaps, we’re all watching and hoping, that’s for sure. But other indicators have arisen to indicate a return to more prosperous times for America and the world.

In China, that country’s largest state-owned construction company pocketed $7.3 billion from investors after an initial public offering of it shares attracted widespread attention. Although the slowdown in the country’s growth caused China State Construction Engineering Corp’s profits to fall last year, its IPO is by far the largest in China this year and the world’s biggest since Visa raised $19 billion in its IPO 16 months ago.

In Europe, nearly a quarter of wide-format printers in the industry today expect business to improve during the remainder of this year with 14 percent already reporting signs of recovery, a recent survey indicates.

In a survey of 400 European printers, 23 percent are pinning hopes on an upturn in the latter part of this year, 25.6 percent expect a change of fortunes to emerge in early 2010. A similar figure anticipates an upturn later, in the second half of the year and less than 12 percent expect conditions to last into 2011.

Fully 83 percent of the survey's respondents say their companies are well-positioned to “take advantage” of market conditions when it rebounds.

And there you have it. Hopefully, we’ll all be on our way soon.

ishipdocs Client Seats - Be Sure To Make Use Of Them

For those PEiR members who have taken advantage of the 90 day free trial of ishipdocs, have you implemented the five “Client Seats” that are part of the trial?

The client seats can lock in your customer, as well as save you and your customers time and money.

You just assign a client seat to a customer, then they will be able to send you files faster and more secure than through FTP.

The customer has an order number at their finger tips and can get the status of their order online without making a phone call. How much time do you spend handling phone calls to give the status of an order each day?

If you have any question on the “Client Seats” call The PEiR Group today at 925 658-0200.

Look Around - Did You Just Walk Past A Sale?

Obviously, construction projects are hard to find right now, and you may feel our services are not exactly needed. That said, there may be a few existing sales opportunities out there you’re walking past everyday.

Are you?

When you’re out on a sales call, don’t forget to take a good, hard look at the building registry in the lobby. Think it over: are there any prospects in the building you haven’t called on yet?

And let’s not forget about “Suite 100,” usually the building’s owners, management company, or leasing agents. Poke your head in and ask around, you may find the onsite manager and you may be surprised to find out how many drawings they have in storage.

Anyone seeing an archiving opportunity? Not only could you scan these drawings to CD for your customers but with PlanWell you could offer long-term storage solutions with PlanWell Legacy.

And where are these little gold mines of steady work located? Hospitals, Class A commercial buildings, school districts and assisted living facilities… to name just a few. They’re out there, are you walking past them or giving them the attention they deserve?

You may be happy you did.

The Author: PEiR Group Account Manager Rick Ysunza

Giving Your Customers An e-Commerce Solution: We'll Show You How!

Over the last decade many reprographers have leveraged the capabilities of the Internet to improve their efficiencies and expand their services.

What can we do now that we couldn’t do a decade ago? Well, we can accept files via email or FTP, offer plan rooms for viewing and ordering and distributing documents, conduct long-distance business over Skype and mitigate the need for expensive business travel with Web conferencing. These are just a few examples of what I call e-Business successes. However, only a few reprographers I have talked with have fully adopted a true e-Commerce offering (pricing and charging customers through the Internet) and presented it to their customers.

I am not sure what is holding back the industry from online pricing; maybe it is because many reprographers are afraid to show prices, the pricing is so complex and every customer has a different price, or that the cost of shipping and other extra charges often associated with a job cannot be determined at the time of ordering. Whatever the reason, I believe it is critical that we get our act together and make it easy for customers to request services over the Web and know what they will spend before they place the order.

When you go online to Amazon or iTunes to buy a book or a song don’t you expect to know what you will pay at the time of transaction? Why should your customers be any different?

If our industry is to evolve we must embrace e-Commerce, make it work for us, and at the same time expand our scope of services that we offer over the Web. Sure, steady clients trust that you will bill them accurately but what about new customers who would like to be doing business with you? Are you making it easy or difficult for them?

As you are all aware, our industry is radically changing, customers who used to order most of the printing in the past are doing significantly less printing today. Many are transferring the printing costs to their customers or suppliers and these new customers are the ones that are actually paying your bills. Sure, the print volumes are less but the profit opportunities in many cases can be even greater than before. But there is one thing that we as an industry must understand: if we are to survive we must be able to sell our services over the Internet and that means we must offer online pricing and a pleasant e-commerce experience.

With this goal in mind, I would like to share with those who are interested, how PlanWell is prepared to take the Reprographics Industry a step closer to an e-commerce solution. Please join me Thursday, July 23rd at 10 a.m. (PT) for a webinar and demonstration on how PlanWell allows students, sub-contractors, realtors, insurance agents and a host of other retail customers to easily conduct e-commerce transactions with your company. We'll have another one on July 30 at 9 a.m. (PT) - we hope you can join us.

Sign-up for the July 23 webinar HERE.

Sign up for the July 30 webinar HERE.

As our industry continues to evolve I believe you’ll find many of your future customers coming to you not only with the expectation of ordering your products and services, but also to see your pricing up front, along with the ability to charge their credit cards at the time of ordering. What are you going to do about it?

Regards,

Shaun Meany