# The state of the industry



## davitos (Sep 5, 2007)

hello everyone,

so we have been in the dtg business for almost 5 years now. we own two tjet 2s and a blazer express. and yes, we are very profitable. however, over the past few years, we recognize a stagnation in the industry. no new ink sets (other than bagged dupont ink) have been released nor printers that are really industry machines at an offordable price reducing labour and time to print small to medium size runs.

the problem still is that with white ink printing you have to keep your machines running - which is what we do - also on sundays. and i doubt wims systems or bagged ink will completely eliminate clogs. we replace our tjet 2 printheads every 5-6 months (each having approx. 6k prints on each of them) even if we run it on a daily basis. also the idea of developing ink sets that do not require pretreatment has not been further explored so far (other than the highly overpriced kornit machines).

looking at the printer side, there has been this brother gt 782 printer which sounds great being a real production and industrial machine, however looking at the ink prices thats a whole different story. who can compete with approx 4 dollars in ink costs alone (dependent on design and print size of course) - not to mention the excessive headcleaning costs. and there still is the pretreatment process which is extremely time consuming.

most other epson based printers are all very much alike and looking at our blazer's 4880 head it is far from being a progress. our blazer express is so slow we could almost print 2 dark shirts on the t-jet 2.

as we have a high load on all of our machines we were looking into purchasing a new, more industrial machine that helps us reduce labour, time and costs and which we do not have to run every day (at least no on sundays) the only option is the kornit (931 or breeze) with about 60k as a starting point. at least it reduces ink costs from $3 to approx $2 as well as being way faster having the pretreatment process integrated.

so we were wondering why there is so few innovation in the dtg industry these days? what would you believe will be the next big thing in dtg? when will we see true innovation?

looking forward to your thoughts....

best,

d


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## ROYAL SAVAGE (Feb 18, 2009)

davitos said:


> hello everyone,
> 
> so we have been in the dtg business for almost 5 years now. we own two tjet 2s and a blazer express. and yes, we are very profitable. however, over the past few years, we recognize a stagnation in the industry. no new ink sets (other than bagged dupont ink) have been released nor printers that are really industry machines at an offordable price reducing labour and time to print small to medium size runs.
> 
> ...


Your thought process is absolutely correct. Kornit is the only alternative for industrial production. The ink cost is reasonable. I own machines that have six figures of prints on them and the run like new. The Spectra heads will out print all other heads over the long term. We print high volume DTG and pound our gear hard. Kornits ink is reasonably priced and the machines themselves pretreat the goods. 
I am partial. There is a community of DTG printers who are industrial minded DTG and they own big heavy machines. The price range of the gear is $50K to $300K. Big nut for many people especiall in this economy.


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## kevrokr (Feb 26, 2007)

ROYAL SAVAGE said:


> Kornit is the only alternative for industrial production.



My customers would disagree with you.


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## JohnL (Nov 23, 2010)

Take what you want from the industry as it is right now. It has gotten better over the years. If you think of it as an industry, it is still in its infant stages. If you think of it as a person it still isn't in its teens. 

Think of it this way if it was completely easy and there was no problems, what would keep the mass public for purchasing a machine that say china makes and using these "non problematic ink" to print personal shirts at a whim. The reason why many individuals are in the business and will stay in business is because this is something that requires care and "know how"

Its no secret the Epson based printers will give you far better quality than what Kornit can offer you. However Kornit will pretreat your shirts for you, and is slightly faster than the epson based models. It does boast a price point 3-4 times greater than the epson based platforms. Really i guess in the end it is the consumers decision.

Just remember if everyone could do it then you probably would no longer be in business.


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## erich (Apr 15, 2009)

this is a very interesting topic that you have raised.

I actually think that there is far more happening behind the scenes than what most people are aware of. I have no doubt that soon enough you will see movement from machine manufacturers, you need only keep an eye on Epson to see that that the vast majority of manfacturers have no choice but to develop further.

There are more high end industrial machines being released, although I do agree that the gap between Epson based machines and high end machines is still too big. 

In the past few years we have also seen new inks introduced, independant ink suppliers have started up. We have seen webshop software by Wilcom/Piki Central and design softwarre by Pulse Microsystems introduced. All these peripherals show that this industry is far from stagnant and offer options to the end users.

I may be biased but I think that our industry is at a turning point for the better.

Jerry
DTG Digital


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## Don-ColDesi (Oct 18, 2006)

> I may be biased but I think that our industry is at a turning point for the better


I don't know that I would call it a turning point, rather a move from the current plateau we have been on for that past 12-18 months. Growth in a market like we are in is really a stair step pattern - not a linear, upward pattern.


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## davitos (Sep 5, 2007)

erich, i really hope you are right when you state that there is probably a lot going on behind the scenes... from a user standpoint, the industry did not really proceed to solve any of our every day problems:
> significantly reduce production times
> significantly reduce maintenance
> better rips (ok, some are quite good already)
> ensure industrial production (about 100 pieces per day) at an affordable invest
> lower ink prices to compete with 100+ orders for screenprint

the industry certainly is moving in some ways - but being one of the first movers here in europe, it proceeds too slowly esp. when looking at the recent machines.

also when you mention piki, i am sure you never used it before, have you? 

please do not take this post to be of negative nature. this was only meant to be a call to action where everybody should participate - maybe a dtg "thinktank"?


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## erich (Apr 15, 2009)

davitos said:


> erich, i really hope you are right when you state that there is probably a lot going on behind the scenes... from a user standpoint, the industry did not really proceed to solve any of our every day problems:
> > significantly reduce production times
> > significantly reduce maintenance
> > better rips (ok, some are quite good already)
> ...


it's not taken in a negative way, I think it is a fair discussion.

1- reduced production time, machines based on Epson are limited to the Epson resolutions and head scan time, you wont see any real changes here I am afraid

2-Significantly reduce maintenance, WIMS and bagged ink systems have greatly improved reliability, you stated that you need to print daily, I can assure you that I often leave my machine for more than a week without doing anything to it. You wont completely remove maintenance though, 5 minutes per day that the machine is actually being used is to be expected and wont change no matter if the machine is based on Epson or industrial heads

3- Faster production, agreed, I too want to close the gap between affordable machines and industrial based machines

4- Lower ink prices, yes that would be great, unfortunately this is controlled by a few giant companies, cheaper ink prices would make our technology more acccepted in some parts of the world.

all I can say is, watch this space, or come to Fespa Hamburg

Jerry
DTG Digital


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## davitos (Sep 5, 2007)

jerry- i been to a bunch of trade shows over the past few years and am always wondering about the topic of this threat... esp. when i been to last years' tecstyle in stuttgart. however, we are thinking of going to hamburg. what do you think what big news or industry breakthrough we could explore there?


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## allamerican-aeoon (Aug 14, 2007)

davitos said:


> jerry- i been to a bunch of trade shows over the past few years and am always wondering about the topic of this threat... esp. when i been to last years' tecstyle in stuttgart. however, we are thinking of going to hamburg. what do you think what big news or industry breakthrough we could explore there?


AA have 8 booth display there. I hope I can meet you there for coffee or beer. I think: Aeoon will be a eye catcher and DTG may/will have "non Epson but Epson" printer (cuz same printhead). 4900 Epson modify has good chance. 3000 Epson (replacement of 13" wide format) modify is done by Japanese.
Memjet single head (future of printing industry) speed. And they are set at pretty reasonable price.
FESPA is more oriented toward Sign, large format and some Offset. DTG is drop in the bucket. Chemical is big in there too.


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## silverarrows (Mar 13, 2009)

as a visitor of the last Fespa Digital in Amsterdam 2 years before I was very disappionted with the very small number of the Direct to Garment printer companies. All I could see was one Körnit 932, 1 DTG Viper + DTG Bullet and 1 Anajet. From the point of view of a DTG printer it can be very sad to been there just to breathe the awful smell of the solvent inks from the giant printers printing signage with a speed of 100m/h.


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## erich (Apr 15, 2009)

Fespa Amsterdam was very disappointing even from a vendors perspective. There were a few more DTG machines there but you really had to look for them. Fespa Fabric was an absolute brilliant show and I hope that Hamburg will be the same.

Peter has rounded up what will be new quite well.

Memjet technology will be there but it wont relate to the DTG market 

Jerry
DTG Digital


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## allamerican-aeoon (Aug 14, 2007)

silverarrows said:


> as a visitor of the last Fespa Digital in Amsterdam 2 years before I was very disappionted with the very small number of the Direct to Garment printer companies. All I could see was one Körnit 932, 1 DTG Viper + DTG Bullet and 1 Anajet. From the point of view of a DTG printer it can be very sad to been there just to breathe the awful smell of the solvent inks from the giant printers printing signage with a speed of 100m/h.


Huh? I was there too. How come you missed me?


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## allamerican-aeoon (Aug 14, 2007)

erich said:


> Peter has rounded up what will be new quite well.
> 
> Memjet technology will be there but it wont relate to the DTG market
> 
> ...


One day!!! Think this way if DTG prints at that speed will people love it? And price of printhead is very good than others. Demands are there right? Then it will be here. Just few touch up necessary. As same as many printhead mfg's have many different heads.


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## silverarrows (Mar 13, 2009)

allamerican said:


> Huh? I was there too. How come you missed me?


sorry for my newbie question but when was the neoflex first launched? 

Are there any news from your side jerry?


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## allamerican-aeoon (Aug 14, 2007)

silverarrows said:


> sorry for my newbie question but when was the neoflex first launched?
> 
> Are there any news from your side jerry?


AA has been selling DTG for 8 years. NeoFlex brand start 4 years ago.

I think Jerry side biggest news is "Epson but No Epson is DTG's news"


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## erich (Apr 15, 2009)

allamerican said:


> One day!!! Think this way if DTG prints at that speed will people love it? And price of printhead is very good than others. Demands are there right? Then it will be here. Just few touch up necessary. As same as many printhead mfg's have many different heads.


 
I have spent time at the Memjet plant, it is only about 30 minutes from my office, I have their engine and heads sitting in our lab, the heads print at a nominal 1.4 pica litre drop size, I dont think that this will suffice for textiles, nor do I think that a pigmented ink will go through these heads. However, like you said, who knows what the future will hold, for now though you wont see Memjet used in textiles

Jerry 
DTG Digital


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## erich (Apr 15, 2009)

allamerican said:


> AA has been selling DTG for 8 years. NeoFlex brand start 4 years ago.
> 
> I think Jerry side biggest news is "Epson but No Epson is DTG's news"


 
Who have you been talking to Peter? You have spies everywhere 

Jerry
DTG Digital


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## allamerican-aeoon (Aug 14, 2007)

erich said:


> Who have you been talking to Peter? You have spies everywhere
> 
> Jerry
> DTG Digital


hahaha, I knew this as an old news. We did with Value Jet Mutho last year but speed was slower than 4900,7900 or 3000 so we decide not to launch. Epson Large format has better speed but ~(you know why since you have spies all over).
We all working on future products endlessly. Called R&D (Rest & Drink) right? These efforts will bring better products to the maket as time goes by.
So, Viper time is over after sell out your inventory. Any fairwell party? No more WIM system please!!!
Looking forward to see you in Hamburg. Beers are on me always, Cheers!!!


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## erich (Apr 15, 2009)

wow Peter you are really jumping to conclusions here. I would ask you not to make comment about our products based on your own assumptions, 

Viper time is far from over

Jerry
DTg Digital


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## allamerican-aeoon (Aug 14, 2007)

erich said:


> wow Peter you are really jumping to conclusions here. I would ask you not to make comment about our products based on your own assumptions,
> 
> Viper time is far from over
> 
> ...


My common sense told me what I will do next when I am in your shoes. If I am wrong, I am sorry but I still think it will be as I predict. We all will watching your next move. I will tell you how trueful you are soon.


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## Don-ColDesi (Oct 18, 2006)

allamerican said:


> AA has been selling DTG for 8 years. NeoFlex brand start 4 years ago.


This would be incorrect Peter. US Screen launched the Fast T-Jet (the first direct to garment printer we *both* sold) at the SGIA show in Minneapolis. We both started selling the machine in early 2005 - which was a little over 6 years ago. Your claim would be that your were selling direct to garment printers in 2003.

In regards to 4 years of NeoFlex - weren't you still selling Flexi-Jets in 2007?


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## Don-ColDesi (Oct 18, 2006)

allamerican said:


> hahaha, I knew this as an old news. We did with Value Jet Mutho last year but speed was slower than 4900,7900 or 3000 so we decide not to launch. Epson Large format has better speed but ~(you know why since you have spies all over).


I didn't know that Dreamjet did anything but covert Epsons, when did they start working on other print engines?

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