Connections
Designing an Eco-Friendly Poster
Your customers are asking for green, your vendors are switching to eco-friendly practices and you’re starting to think about your own environmental impact. So, are you “green printing?” Are you using “green” paper, environmentally sustainable inks, and reducing your waste? Do you know where to begin?
I read a great article recently on Gather.com, How to Design an Eco-Friendly Poster, and the author, Anna Cruz, did a nice job of outlining tips to make any poster printing campaign just a little bit more “green.” That said, I still think she missed a few:
- Do shorter runs. In the Gather.com article, Cruz suggests consolidating your marketing campaigns, essentially cutting down on your poster printing by limiting the number of campaigns you run. I’d suggest that instead of running fewer campaigns just print smarter. With ultraviolet printing, you can do short, full color runs in the exact quantities you want. So, with planning, you can cut down on your printing and paper usage without having to cut your campaigns.
- Advertise your “green” printing practices. Cruz got it right on this one. She suggests putting a note or symbol on your posters letting people know you’re using recycled paper, greener inks or eco-friendly printing practices. Customers like to support a responsible organization, so let them know what you’re doing.
- Make your posters reusable. With ultraviolet printing, you can make your own green paper by creating posters that can be printed on again and again. UV inks can be applied to almost any surface, meaning you can print over the same piece of plywood or plastic again and again. Now, that’s what I call recycling.
- Go Double-sided. With offset printing, going double-sided is expensive because printers have to wait for ink to dry on both sides. With UV printing, it’s cheap, fast, simple and very cost-effective. Like Cruz points out in her Gather article, hanging your poster in a window gets you double the exposure without having to use two posters.
- Use green inks. If you’re going to implement “green” printing practices and buy “green” paper, you should also be using environmentally friendly inks. UV inks produce virtually no volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and are generally considered to be significantly more environmentally responsible than traditional chemical-based inks.
Great Sign Ideas for Realtors
Traditionally, large-format printing had to be done in either bulk or at great expense for a single sign. The cost was so high that full color wasn’t even a consideration. Now, with ultraviolet printing, UV-equipped printers can do single real estate signs at prices that are affordable.
That means you can create large, sharp, full color signs for each of your properties without breaking your marketing budget. So, now that the technology’s available, what are you going to do with it?
Include full-color photographs
Instead of pointing house hunters to a website or a phone number, use ultraviolet printing and large-format signs to actually show them inside the house. This is your chance to create sharp, bright, full-color signage with space for interior photos, so use it.
Go durable
Outdoor real estate signs need to be able to withstand the elements. Ultraviolet printing is ideal for outdoor use and can last much longer than many vinyls and laminates without fading or cracking. Ask your printer about special UV coatings and outdoor applications.
Make a large-format flyer
By replicating the photographs and information typically printed on a flyer, your poster will minimize flyer usage. Most Realtors would recommend keeping the flyer box as a way of providing curious buyers with a takeaway item, but a large format poster will cut down on waste, satisfy the curiosity of most passers-by and reduce the time and money spent refilling your boxes.
Print directly on any hard surface
One of the biggest benefits of ultraviolet printing is that you can create real estate signs on almost any surface. For example, a properly equipped print shop could even do a full color print right on a property’s front door (note: you’ll have to replace the door before you close). The point is, you can get creative – printing on sign posts, old signage and classic bulletins without being limited to a single color.
We once printed on a full-size door with our Legend 72HUV wide format printer, so we now it could be done. Imagine printing an interior shot of what’s behind the door on the door.
Low-Cost Event Posters
Here in Indianapolis, and I imagine in most communities in the U.S., we host a number of events, festivals and community gatherings. Every one of them advertises with posters. Some shell out the money for big, glossy, offset-printed posters, others opt for cheaper black and white posters. But, the smart ones print less and for less by ordering posters printed using ultraviolet printing on the Legend 72HUV wide format printer.
Why ultraviolet printing?
- You can do shorter runs. Unlike offset color printing where you have to print thousands of posters to make it worth your while, UV printing lets you do short runs for a lot less. This is great news for small festivals or neighborhood-specific events that don’t need 1,000 color posters.
- You can easily do venue or event-specific posters. Because of the run-size limitations of offset printing, most festivals opt for single, generic posters that try to cover every single event and happening. With the Legend 72HUV printer, you can afford to print color posters for each and every separate event and venue while still maintaining your festival brand identity.
- Go bigger (much bigger) and for cheaper. Ultraviolet printing has opened the door to affordable large-format printing. You don’t have to limit your event posters to 17 x 22. Now you can afford that massive, full-color banner or full wall wash.
- Multi-surface printing. Event posters don’t have to be printed on paper. Because ultraviolet printing can be done on almost any substrate or surface, you can print your event details on Gator boards, plywood, plastic sheeting and a wide range of other surfaces. This option is even more useful when it comes to signage at the event itself and because you can print over materials, you can reuse signs year after year.
Even if you’re not an event or festival in Central Indiana, there are still ways to find this technology in your area. Contact us at (877) 626-6848, and we’ll be happy to locate a ultraviolet printing-capable sign shop in your area.
Low-Cost Posters for Bands
You’re in a band, you have a gig almost every other week and you’re spending a fortune on posters. Or, you’re headed out on tour and you’re shipping out generic posters with a blank space at the bottom so the promoter can fill out the show information by hand…with a Sharpie…maybe…if she gets around to it. What’s wrong with this picture? Well, for one, it doesn’t have to be this way.
Wide format ultraviolet printing lets bands and musicians do short runs of massive, full color posters for a fraction of the cost of offset printing or silkscreening. Instead of photocopied, black and white, Office Depot specials, you can actually afford real posters that command attention with punch and color.
Traditionally, color posters were out of reach because you either had to shell out $2 for color copies (that look terrible) or order a run of thousands to even make it worth your while. And unless you’re independently wealthy, you’re not going to do that for each and every individual show.
Now, thanks to wide-format ultraviolet printing technology, color posters can be done cheaply, quickly and in small quantities. You need 20 posters for the gig in Spokane and 300 for the one in Brooklyn and you want them both to list the specific show information, including openers? No problem.
With ultraviolet printing, you can also do full color printing on almost any surface. You’re not just limited to paper posters. Bring your bass drum head in, we can print on it. Bring your guitar in (sans strings) and we can probably print on that too. Heck, bring the door to your jam space in, we can print on it! It also means you can do your posters on vinyl, plywood, Gator board, plastic sheeting and almost any other surface you can dream up.
Even if you’re not a band in Central Indiana, there are still ways to find this technology in your area. Contact us at (877) 626-6848, and we’ll be happy to locate a Legend 72HUV sign shop capable of doing ultraviolet printing and posters in your area. We can also ship to you
How Visual Artists Can Promote and Sell Their Work With Ultraviolet Printing
We have a thriving arts community here in Indianapolis. Visual artists, dancers, writers, actors, musicians all comprise one of the best arts communities here in the Midwest. We have a monthly arts/gallery walk on the first Friday of every month called — what else? — First Friday. And everywhere you walk there are flyers, printed posters, and postcards inviting us to attend their next gallery showing.
Artists are an ideal user for the Legend 72HUV wide format printer. This ultraviolet ink printer is capable of producing eye-popping graphics, filled with vivid colors and sharp detail. Any artist who is currently making color photocopies at their local copy shop or printing flyers on their desktop computer at home is doing themselves a disservice.
Here are a few ways you can promote your art with ultraviolet printing technology.
- Prints: For you digital artists and photographers, rather than paying for high-cost prints on traditional paper, consider using an unusual medium like plywood or even foam core board. We have used our printer to print signs on plywood, gator board, vinyl, and even a door. So, sure we can do high-gloss paper, but make your art really stand out by printing on something no one else has.
- Posters: This is especially crucial for you visual artists who show some of your work in your promotional posters. Create special posters for your upcoming exhibits, or commemorative posters for family and friends. Gallery owners, take note. This is something for you to consider too.
- Flyers: The nice thing about a wide-format printer is that you can run several 8.5 x 11 flyers on one big sheet. This can bring down the per piece cost for running full-color flyers, especially if you’re printing to high-gloss paper or if you need to print to both sides.
- Prints for Sale: This is especially important for painters. Now you can sell prints of your work for $50 – $75 apiece, while your original paintings are going for a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars. This helps promote your art, creates additional fans, and gets your art into the hands of more people.
- Postcards: Hopefully you’ve been collecting a mailing list of people who visit your exhibitions. If so, send postcards inviting people to your upcoming exhibits with a variable data postcard — not only do you put their name and address on the postcard, but you can even add a personalized message to your favorite patrons.
Thanks to the latest developments in printing technology, there’s no reason artists shouldn’t use this as a way to promote and produce their art. If you would like more information, you can call us at (877) 626-6848, or find us at LloydsOfIndiana.com.