Print Company

A print company, as its name implies, prints a variety of media including newspapers, magazines, posters, flyers, banners, brochures, catalogs, and stationery both for businesses and individuals.

We are so used to seeing many of these media in our everyday life that we fail to think of how or who produced them. Take for example posters on roadside billboards, when did you last think of who printed them? Or newspapers and magazines, which are available in supermarkets and stores and street vendors, when did you last think about who printed them? To a certain extent, we have become immune to commercial printing and no longer stop to wonder who printed that poster or brochure.

A print company whether located in the high street, a business park or online, is competing against many other businesses offering the same or similar services and products. If you look through your local phone book under print company, you will probably find numerous entries for printers advertising their services and products. So how do you choose the right one for you? Well, one way is by word of mouth by speaking to other businesses or individuals and following-up on their recommendation. Another is to check if the print company is a member of a trade association and, if they are, that should give you confidence that their work meets a professional standard and that the company adheres to code of conduct and service to its customers.

A professional print company can design and supply various eye-catching colorful high quality brochures, flyers, posters, and banners to advertise a business, helping to attract new customers as well as retain existing ones. They can also design and supply the stationery requirements a business needs from letterheads and business cards, through to invoices, delivery notes and other business forms.

Some print companies specialize in producing one or two types of media, e.g. banners and signs. Whilst others are general printers and print a broad range of material. The most common methods used by printers are:

  • Thermography – a process that gives a raised image
  • Digital Printing – where a digital images is reproduced on a tangible surface
  • Screen or Silk Printing – forces ink through a screen like a stencil
  • Electrostatic Printing – toner fuses to a charged cylinder and is thermally bonded onto a page
  • Offset Lithography – based on the ‘water and oil’ do not mix and very versatile
  • Embossed Printing – dry or heat embossing produces a 3-dimensional or raised image
  • Letterpress Printing –process that uses slightly raised images on a plate similar to a rubber stamp
  • Flexography – uses rubber plates with a raised image
  • Gravure Printing – high quality direct contact technique between the paper and an engraved copper plate.

A customer must have faith in the competence of the print company they employ to produce their printing requirements and this bond of trust leads to a beneficial working relationship for both parties. A print company must meet the expectation of their customers on service, quality, price and deadlines.