Reviews of thick and rigid printable
materials will be focus for 2015

Posted Jan. 2, 2015

Inks, media, and inkjet-printable substrates will be reviewed during January. We will be issuing lots of new FLAAR Reports to review and evaluate what interesting materials you can use to print on your UV-cured flatbed.

Honeycomb sandwich board and aluminum composite materials (ACM or ACP, Aluminum Composite Materials) will be covered.

Then reports on diverse kinds of foam core, foam board, even foam covered with innovative materials.

So please return every two weeks to see the new web pages on printable media plus the full-color PDF editions of reviews of new and different kinds of material for your digital printing.

First printer & signage expo in USA: GoA 2015 in Miami

First posted Dec. 22, 2014

We have noticed that many print shop owners, managers, and distributors and manufacturers keep an eye on which expos FLAAR attends. So to help planning we are announcing already now in December, what expos we will attend in 2015.

Graphics of the Americas is an expo we have attended 8 years out of the last 10 years. Plus Dr Nicholas Hellmuth gives lectures on the world of wide-format inkjet each year now for several years.

Two of us from FLAAR will fly up to GOA 2015 in the popular South Beach area of Miami Beach, Florida.

If you are from Mexico, Central America, Caribbean, South America, or across the USA and Canada we hope to see you here, 26-28 February.

You can ask for a consulting session with Dr Nicholas by writing for availability and fee schedule at FrontDesk "at" FLAAR.org.

Of course you can also attend the lectures (in Spanish, and other topics in English) and there is no consulting fee. But many people also like to receive a full Subscription to TRENDs level FLAAR Reports, which is included if you sign up for a consulting session.

You can also fly Dr Nicholas to your company headquarters so that your entire team can ask their questions.

Worth Attending, indeed SIX of us at FLAAR were there

Updated January 22, 2015. Previously updated Dec 22, 2014 and May 27, 2014; first posted April, 2014

Every year we send our team of evaluators to the major trade shows around the world. After 15 years experience attending printer and signage trade shows, we know which expos are worth the effort (and which expos are no longer worth visiting: we really enjoyed VISCOM Madrid, but stopped going already six years ago).

I went to VISCOM Milano every single year: but stopped going in 2012 (because most Italian colleagues said it was no longer worth attending (FESPA in Europe had a wider range of products, so we will attend FESPA 2015 in Cologne)).

Many colleagues in Brazil said due to new ownership (same owners as IPEX in the UK) and new location, that the once-immense Serigrafia, Sign, Future Textil (sic) was no longer worth flying so far and incurring all the costs of airfare, hotel, and meals. We really hope these expos can recuperate and return to growth, but until they improve we do not attend.

APPPEXPO in Shanghai we have attended for about seven years. First I went by myself. It was so large that next year I returned with an assistant. Every year I added more staff since the expo kept growing (now we send at least six of us to APPPPEXPO 2015.

Realize that for 2015 this massive printer and signage expo is now in March (and in a different expo center in Shanghai).

Shanghai is a remarkable city (and definitely less crime than Atlanta expo area in USA!).

People in China are friendly and the staff in the booths speak better English than in any expo in two other countries (to be polite I will not name the other countries, but in both there was no interest in speaking English or even Spanish or German or any other major international language).

So Shanghai is a great place to visit. We hope to see you here this March (2015). To get an attendee pass, sign up and register here: www.apppexpo.com/2/EN/Visitor

Below are the FLAAR Reports for APPPEXPO from a recent year; these can serve as a "what to expect" for APPPEXPO 2015.

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Glasstec 2014 was this past October

Posted Oct 16, 2014

Glasstec is for glass the way ITMA is to textiles the way Tecnargilla is for ceramics: Glasstec 2010 and Glasstec 2012 were very impressive, especially the depth of diverse kinds of inks used to print on glass. Plus, what is especially important, are the chemicals needed before printing and after printing.

So Dr Nicholas Hellmuth, Senior Review Editor of FLAAR, attended Glasstec 2014 in Duesseldorf. With a Germanic name such as Hellmuth, he will be at home, since German is his third language, after English and Spanish. Since FLAAR is read around the world most of our editors are multi-lingual.

Unfortunately Glasstec was the same week as SGIA in Las Vegas, but we still felt that it was essential to attend Glasstec 2014 since the American glass expo, GlassBuild America is nowhere near as thorough in its coverage.

Another reason for attending Glasstec is that the Hellmuth family is an architectural dynasty for three generations: grandfather, great-uncle; then Nicholas's father formed Hellmuth, Yamasaki + Leinweber, then formed HOK (Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum), one of the three largest architectural firms in the world. So we at FLAAR study all printers and inks for printing on architectural materials: glass, ceramic tiles (Tecnargilla expo several weeks ago in Rimini), and printing textiles for interior decoration (ITMA and also ShanghaiTex). Plus we write about wallpaper and wallcoverings (inks, substrates, printers, and lamination or coatings).

Glass is easy to print on, but most ink fails to adhere adequately. So we study printers for glass in all aspects. Hence it is essential to attend Glasstec 2014 in the pleasant city of Duesseldorf, Germany.

Four from FLAAR Reports attended SGIA

Posted Oct 15, 2014

Unfortunately SGIA was on the same days as Glasstec in Duesseldorf. But four of us attended SGIA since SGIA is a stable expo. Indeed SGIA is one of the few wide-format and signage expos in the world which is really healthy.

FESPA 2015 in Cologne, SGI 2015 (Sign Middle East), Sign Istanbul 2015 all are doing well also. APPPEXPO 2015 in Shanghai is doing amazingly well (over 90 brands of UV printers; over 205 models of UV-cured printers).

We recommend SGIA because it is holding its own in a world of printer expos which are collapsing (VISCOM Madrid) or which fell by close to half (ITMA 2014, VISCOM Milano over the last three years). Graph Expo 2014 was waaaayy down (but still great to attend for copiers and digital replacements for offset, plus great for commercial printers and all the workflow equipment).

We enjoyed SGIA in Las Vegas: inks, media & substrates, textile printers and inks, T-shirt printers, inks and toner, cutters, RIP software, and hopefully color management and MIS software were the main topics of importance in the world of inkjet, signage, and textile printing.

Glasstec 2014 was this past October

Posted Oct 16, 2014

Glasstec is for glass the way ITMA is to textiles the way Tecnargilla is for ceramics: Glasstec 2010 and Glasstec 2012 were very impressive, especially the depth of diverse kinds of inks used to print on glass. Plus, what is especially important, are the chemicals needed before printing and after printing.

So Dr Nicholas Hellmuth, Senior Review Editor of FLAAR, attended Glasstec 2014 in Duesseldorf. With a Germanic name such as Hellmuth, he will be at home, since German is his third language, after English and Spanish. Since FLAAR is read around the world most of our editors are multi-lingual.

Unfortunately Glasstec was the same week as SGIA in Las Vegas, but we still felt that it was essential to attend Glasstec 2014 since the American glass expo, GlassBuild America is nowhere near as thorough in its coverage.

Another reason for attending Glasstec is that the Hellmuth family is an architectural dynasty for three generations: grandfather, great-uncle; then Nicholas's father formed Hellmuth, Yamasaki + Leinweber, then formed HOK (Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum), one of the three largest architectural firms in the world. So we at FLAAR study all printers and inks for printing on architectural materials: glass, ceramic tiles (Tecnargilla expo several weeks ago in Rimini), and printing textiles for interior decoration (ITMA and also ShanghaiTex). Plus we write about wallpaper and wallcoverings (inks, substrates, printers, and lamination or coatings).

Glass is easy to print on, but most ink fails to adhere adequately. So we study printers for glass in all aspects. Hence it is essential to attend Glasstec 2014 in the pleasant city of Duesseldorf, Germany.

Graph Expo 2014 still popular but much smaller each year

Posted Oct 6, 2014

We at FLAAR recommend attending Graph Expo in Chicago if you are interested in the five top brands of wide-format printers, or if you want to see office printers and mailing systems. But APPPEXPO in Shanghai had 90 brands of UV-cured printers alone (not counting the scores and scores of eco-solvent printer brands and lots of textile printer brands).

Plus, sadly, the wide-format pavilion of Graph Expo was too empty: too much PR made you expect a BIG fancy area. Instead it was just aisles of double width, empty unoccupied booth areas, other booths which were given free just to try to fill space, and lots of tables and chairs to cover over the fact that not many brands wanted to exhibit here.

The expo itself is fine, just that the PR releases are exaggerated, so you come to see what is claimed is available: and instead you see empty areas; empty floor space, in every part of the hall (since Heidelberg pulled out and not even Agfa is here any more).

But HP is here; Canon and Xerox had large and popular booths. EFI had a big and popular booth and had excellent coverage every day in the "Show Daily" newspaper.

So if only the PR releases could be totally toned down, and if claims of BIG wide-format pavilion could be muted, then everyone can enjoy what is still present (and not be looking for everything which was claimed but was embarrassingly missing).

Chicago is a great place to visit; and Graph Expo still has lots of brands for office printing, commercial printing, and mailing of what is printed. Just that for wide-format inkjet, it is safer not to claim too much, since APPPEXPO in Shanghai had 171 booths of media and printable substrates. I did not notice more than three or four booths of media at Graph Expo, and mostly just for office printers.

If you attend only Graph Expo you can be content; but if you travel all year to expos everywhere, your vision is a tad better rounded. Even Sign Istanbul had more wide-format everything than Graph Expo (two of us from FLAAR attend Sign Istanbul every year). Then we flew to Photokina: smaller every year but still big enough to attract massive crowds; this is the busiest expo I have visited in the entire world all year (even though it is smaller each time). We want all expos to be successful, but if no one admits to reality, and if PR releases make claims which show they are not familiar with the wide-format printer industry, misleading expectations arise.

I hope that Graph Expo can co-locate with another expo (more than just a tiny packaging aisle) so that Graph Expo can continue. Six years ago even FLAAR had a booth, and the wide-format pavilion had inks, media, printers and everything.

IPEX is one good lesson. VISCOM Spain is another (Sign Madrid; they never could brand themselves understandably). Their web sites do not even explain why they don't exist any more: yet for years their PR releases claimed each VISCOM was so great, so big, so filled, so many attendees! (fortunately VISCOM Paris was actually well attended this year, so there is still hope…but only if organizers wake up and don't hide under excessive PR claims).

Sign Istanbul 2014 first day revealed a large printer expo

Updated Sept. 10, 2014
Posted August 20, 2014

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There are many reasons to attended Sign Istanbul, first, it is the longest-running sign and printer expo for wide-format inkjet printing in this part of the world.

Second: Istanbul is a great place to visit, so you can bring your entire family or at least a travel partner.

FLAAR attends Sign Istanbul every year. There are lots of ink companies, media (especially rigid ACM (also called ACP), printers, cutters: and all the rest of the workflow.

The web site is www.SignIstanbul.com; click on UK flag to get English.

Two of us from FLAAR attended the show, and arrived two days early, we spent lots of time during these two set-up days checking everyone's booth.

New printer & signage trade show in Panamá, 15-18 July

Posted July 14, 2014

Two people of our FLAAR staff flew to experience the second year event of Panamá Expo Gráfica, in Centro de Convenciones Atlapa.

There are two large hotels across the street from the expo center: Sheraton and Aloft Panama Hotel, so the expo center was very convenient to hotels (also, hotel prices do not gouge you as at most expos in some other countries).

Dr. Nicholas was a guest speaker at the opening ceremony to inaugurate this year's event.

He presented two different lectures during that week. This was arranged by Arq. Brenda Morales (Nicholas's Hellmuth family background is architecture; so we also study printing on architectural materials). This expo was a generic printing and graphic arts expo.

In one week Dr Hellmuth will be hosted to present lectures in the Middle East.