Inkjet & Digital Printing

The KODAK NEXPRESS SX Platform Helps Full-Service Printer 1-800-Postcards Secure a Competitive Advantage and Generate Growth

Friday 25. January 2013 - With more than 35 years of experience in the printing industry, 1-800-Postcards understands the importance of delivering consistent, high-quality printed materials to its customers. The full-service company first built its reputation as an offset printer and then expanded into digital printing 10 years ago with the installation of two KODAK NEXPRESS 3000 Presses.

1-800-Postcards has recently enhanced its digital printing capabilities even further by investing in a KODAK NEXPRESS SX3300 Press.
The company recently changed floors in its SoHo location to accommodate the influx of new business. As part of the project, 1-800-Postcards upgraded its presses, revamped its internal ordering processes and spent over one million dollars in designing a storefront with a unique agency-like aesthetic. 1-800-Postcards takes pride in being the only provider in Manhattan that utilizes the KODAK NEXPRESS Digital Color Platform and attributes its recent growth to its comprehensive digital printing capabilities.
“Right now, I am highly focused on company growth in digital,” said David Moyal, President of 1-800-Postcards. “I have gone to practically every printing show across the country over the years and have seen these shows be taken over by digital print. This is where the industry is heading. While we still maintain a successful offset business, we are doing our best to expand our service offerings in the digital arena. In my opinion, anyone who goes digital is going to end up a winner.”
1-800-Postcards utilizes the NEXPRESS Platform to meet the dynamic needs of its diverse client base, ranging from large design agencies and leading brands to small retail businesses and individual consumers. The company captures orders both on-site and through its website, and required a high performing press to keep up with the demands in quality and turnaround times. Moyal knew that the addition of the NEXPRESS SX Press with the Fifth Imaging Unit Solution would help the company gain a greater competitive advantage in the marketplace after seeing the exceptional performance of the initial NEXPRESS Presses.
“We are continuously inspired by the creativity of customers maximizing the full potential of the NEXPRESS Platform,” said Jerry Miller, Kodak’s Vice President and General Manager of America’s Digital Printing Solutions. “The NEXPRESS Fifth Imaging Unit’s capabilities enable printers like 1-800-Postcards to expand into even more profitable services and enhance their company’s bottom line. Offering more differentiated and valuable products to customers supports printers’ efforts to achieve greater customer acquisition and retention. It is a win-win for all involved.”
The NEXPRESS Platform prints on more than 800 standard offset substrates and enables duplex printing with ease. 1-800-Postcards gives its customers the option to print larger sized applications thanks to the long-sheet feeder. Customers can also differentiate their applications through watermarking, protection coating, high-quality glossing, in-line dimensional printing and spot colors with the Fifth Imaging Unit Solution. Moyal feels these extended printing features are enabling them to bring in new business opportunities that didn’t exist when they pursued offset printing alone.
“We are in the heart of the creative section of N.Y.C. and these designers can now get more creative with their printing, at a cheaper cost, through digital print,” said Moyal. “We are able to better serve our existing clients and bring in new ones. We often show prospective customers how easily we can achieve effects like dimensional printing or clear gloss using the KODAK NEXPRESS Fifth Imaging Unit Solutions, and they immediately want to know how it can be done. We are happy to tell them that it can only be achieved on the NEXPRESS Platform.”
In an independent photo quality study completed by SpencerLab, it was found that the KODAK NEXPRESS SX Press achieved the overall highest rating for photographic print quality, demonstrating the best all-round performance across the majority of attributes evaluated.
The NEXPRESS SX Press features Print Genius, a suite of productivity and quality control tools developed specifically to automate tasks and help printers maintain peak quality throughout the production run. The KODAK NEXPRESS Intelligent Calibration System (ICS) version 3 software also helps to maintain print uniformity and fast processing. Together, these features can enable printers to achieve fast turnaround times with increased press uptime and consistent imaging without the risk of sacrificing the quality they desire. “We have great flexibility with the NEXPRESS Platform. We had one customer who wanted to change his business cards, so we made the necessary adjustments and were able to get the file on the press and printed within 15 minutes. You can’t do that unless you have a quality digital printer,” said Moyal. “The NEXPRESS Platform’s imaging quality rivals that of offset. Customers demand the best quality from us and, fortunately, we are able to do that through Kodak’s robust digital printing solution.” In addition to investing in NEXPRESS technology, 1-800-Postcards also uses KODAK THERMAL DIRECT Non Process Plates for high-quality offset printing. Since THERMAL DIRECT Plates do not require processing, they offer streamlined and simplified platemaking, reduced operational costs and labor, and greater overall prepress efficiency than traditionally processed plates. THERMAL DIRECT Plates completely eliminate plate processing so 1-800-Postcards can reduce environmental impact and costs with no processing chemistry and save time, money, and floor space with no processing equipment. THERMAL DIRECT Plates even go a step further to improve the image stability and consistency of printed materials by eliminating processing variability and offering reliable imaging job after job.