Released during the ongoing Fespa 2015 in Cologne, Germany (18 May-22 May 2015), the far-reaching global industry survey ever conducted by the organisation, the Print Census exposes six overarching trends.

 

The first among them is the rising optimism among the respondents, fuelled by their confidence in revenue growth. The second trend is that print is now a service industry, where customer demands are driving continued efforts to improve efficiency, enabling faster job turnaround, just-in-time delivery, delivery to the point of need, and versioning/personalisation.

 

The third is the changing product mix. The trend is moving from mass production to mass customisation. The fourth trend confirms that digital technology is the change-enabler. The fifth trend is that textile printing is catching on in a big way. It has seen major growth in graphics, garment, decor and industrial markets. The sixth trend is that the future of sign and display printing is integrated with digital media.

 

Over 1,200 respondents worldwide fully completed the extensive survey between May 2014 and April 2015. Total 50% of respondents were from the Americas, 42% from Europe and 8% from the Asia Pacific region. The respondents represent the full spectrum of print businesses, including screen and digital printers (34%); commercial, quick printers and reprographic shops (15%); sign makers (13%); graphic designers (7%); advertising agencies (5%); and others.

 

New to this survey were industrial manufacturers that made up 8% of respondents, representing an emerging community of digital print users.

 

The survey is part of an ongoing collaboration between InfoTrends and Fespa.

 

“The Fespa Print Census paints a clear picture of an energised community in which business leaders have a clear and positive vision of the future and are reaping the commercial rewards,” Neil Felton, CEO, Fespa, said, “Despite a mixed macro-economic picture globally, printers across continents are responding to clients’ changing needs, diversifying their product offering, making calculated technology investments with a focus on efficiency and mass customisation, and embracing the changing role of print in the communications mix.”

 

The Fespa Census was funded through Fespa’s Profit for Purpose programme, which invests revenues from Fespa’s global events for the befit of the global printing community.

 

The following are the six trends from Fespa Print Census.

 

1. Confidence swells on back of revenue growth

Total 80% of respondents are very optimistic or fairly optimistic for their businesses. This exceeds their optimism for the industry as a whole by 14%, indicating that respondents feel confident in their own business growth strategies, while remaining less sure of the industry’s broader ability to evolve.

 

That individual optimism is founded on commercial success. Looking at responses from developed markets, average revenues have more than doubled over the same period, from 3 million euros in 2007 to over 6.25 million euros in 2015. Overall, revenue growth from 2007 to 2015 was about 9% CAGR for the overall business, and 7% for digital wide-format.

 

2. Print is a service industry

Customer demands are driving continued efforts to improve efficiency, enabling faster job turnaround, just-in-time delivery, delivery to the point of need, and versioning/personalisation. At least 70% of respondents expect these four key customer trends to increase or stay the same, reinforcing the notion that today’s print businesses are now customer-service driven.

 

Adoption of digital processes – including production systems, workflow, automation and web-to-print - is motivated by these expectations.

 

3. From mass production to mass customisation

Banners (49%), posters (40%), signs (38%) and billboards (37%) remain the top four products being produced by respondents. A dramatic growth being experienced is in textiles for garments, textiles for décor and packaging samples, with close to 80% of respondents reporting an increase in demand for these applications.

 

Respondents report increased adoption of digital production for many of these products, with garments, decals and printed electronics most frequently predicted to migrate to digital in the future.

 

The changing applications mix is also reflected in the rise of rigid materials, which now represent 25% of output among respondents.

 

4. Digital technology is the change-enabler

Over half of all Fespa Print Census respondents indicated their intent to buy digital wide-format printing equipment, with a mean spending plan of close to 100,000 euros.

 

Purchasing plans are dominated by UV printers (27%), textile printers (21%), solvent printers (17%), eco-solvent printers (16%) and latex printers (14%). Contour cutters and laminators top respondents’ planned acquisitions in finishing.

 

The majority of those investing (45%) are motivated to do so by the move into new markets with new products or services.

 

Investment is also driven by the desire to enhance print quality (43%), increase capacity (37%), improve output speed (34%) and reduce unit costs (33%).

 

5. Textile is the dominant growth application

Textile is the dominant growth application among Print Census respondents. Total 27% are already involved in garment printing, with 81% seeing growth in this segment, the highest of any growth application. Digital is a key enabler here, with over half of respondents expecting digitally produced garments to become an important alternative to traditional screen printing in the next two years.

 

Textile printers feature prominently among investment plans, with 21% of respondents specifically focussing spend in this area, supported by 12% planning to acquire thermal transfer equipment. Decorative and industrial textile applications also feature heavily, with 78% of those surveyed reporting growth in textiles for décor applications. Textile substrates continue to make inroads in the signage and graphics space, with 67% observing sustained growth in soft signage.

 

6. The future of sign is integrated with digital media

More than three quarters of respondents expect live media and LCD screen advertising to impact the wide-format business in the foreseeable future, with 36% of respondents stating that these technologies are already impacting the business.

 

Total 31% of those surveyed plan to offer digital signage solutions to their customer base in the next 12 months.