Digital printing technology has shown inherent advantages in various industries, especially in product customization, shortened turnaround time and small batch production. However, how to achieve large-scale production in a cost-effective manner remains its biggest challenge. Digital printing also shows similar characteristics and difficulties in the wallpaper printing market.

Advantages of Digital Printing in Wallpaper Printing Market

Highly Customizable
David Lopez, Professional Imaging Product Manager of Epson USA, noted that digital printing offers a variety of advantages to the wallpaper printing market, including customization, versatility, and productivity. Digital printing allows for highly customized designs on a variety of medias and eliminates the need for traditional setup processes, such as plate making or screen preparation, which reduces costs.

High Production Efficiency
Kitt Jones, Business Development and Co-Creation Manager of Roland DGA, emphasized that digital printing eliminates the need for inventory, allows for 100% customization by design, and reduces costs and provides better control over production and turnaround time. This makes digital printing ideal for producing small quantities of customized wallpaper without the need for large minimum order quantities.

Suitable for Short Runs
Michael Bush, Marketing Communications Manager of FUJIFILM Ink Solutions Group, noted that inkjet and broader digital technologies are ideal for producing short runs and customized wallpaper prints. Themed and customized wallpapers are very popular in the decoration of hotels, hospitals, restaurants, retail stores, and offices, but they have high technical requirements for wallpapers including odorless printing, scratch resistance, washability, light resistance, etc.

Various Suitable Media/Material
The versatility of digital printing on a variety of materials suitable for wallpaper allows for a wide range of textures, finishes and durability options. Oscar Vidal, global director of HP large-format portfolio, said digital printing reduces waste by eliminating excess inventory and minimizing the risk of overproduction.

Challenges of Digital Printing in Wallpaper Printing Market

Productivity and Cost-effectiveness
While digital printing technology excels in short-term and personalized projects, but weather it can match the productivity and cost of analog methods in industrial mass production remains a key challenge.

Durability
Wallpaper needs to be resistant to wear, tear, and fading. HP Latex Inks are used to produce more durable prints through dispersion polymerization of water, making digital printing more resistant to fading, water damage, and abrasion.

Substrate Suitability
Not all substrates are suitable for digital printing. The surface of some media may be too absorbent, causing the ink to not spread properly. In addition, wallpaper may have dust and loose fibers that need to be treated before entering the printer to ensure reliability.

Output Quality
The quality of digital printing initially struggled to match that of traditional methods such as screen printing or gravure printing. However, with improvements in color accuracy and resolution, digital printing is now able to meet or even exceed industry quality standards.

Raising Awareness
Kitt Jones, Business Development and Co-Creation Manager of Roland DGA, noted that the main challenges are to raise awareness of printers and materials, ensure that potential customers understand the entire printing process, and ensure that users have the right combination of printers, inks, and media to meet their customers’ needs.

Digital printing technology brings many advantages to the wallpaper printing market, especially in terms of customization, versatility and small batch production. However, to achieve economic benefits in industrial mass production, challenges such as productivity, durability, substrate adaptability and output quality still need to be overcome. With the continuous advancement of technology and the improvement of market awareness, the application prospects of digital printing in the wallpaper market will be broader.

HongJet, a business department of HONGSAM, launched special latex wallpaper printer and wallpaper water based latex inks several years ago.

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