As a paint company, there are certain industry practices you have to put up with even if they damage your business.

We all know what they are. Ordering excessive numbers of cans to ensure you meet demand, which usually means over-ordering so you don’t run out. Not only do these cost you, they need storing. And of course, unused cans have to be discarded, which is not just wastage, but can be an extra cost in itself.

Print orders take a long time to come through because of extended press set-up times and reorders don’t come quickly either. And that’s before we’ve even mentioned those expensive minimum order quantities (MOQ).

Still, that’s just life isn’t it? Something you can’t do anything about, right?

Wrong. If this is you, then you don’t need to put up with it. There’s a better way, and that way is digital.

There’s barely any aspects of life that haven’t been revolutionised by digital technology over the past decade. Yet it would seem like the print industry has avoided modernisation, buried its head in the sand and kept on with its analogue traditions. But if you look in the right places, you can find progress and innovation. It is there, if you look for it.

At Springfield Solutions we’ve been spearheading digital print for more than 20 years. We bought our first digital press in 1996 and have been pushing the boundaries of what can be achieved ever since.

We matched the quality of traditional print a long time ago, but with advances in the presses available, we’re now competing on run length.

But that barely touches the surface when it comes to the advantages and efficiencies we can bring the paint industry.

Firstly, there are no MOQs. That’s right, none. This means you can have a single label printed if that is all you need. Or 10 or 54, or 109, or 100,000. The choice is yours. What you absolutely don’t have to do, however, is have thousands more printed than you actually need, just to fulfil a printer’s MOQ, and then pay for that privilege. If that is you, we can help.

Reordering is much easier too, because the artwork is stored as a digital file rather than old fashioned printing plates. And if you change your artwork, there’s no problem, we just update it and print your new design. It’s as simple as that. You’re not penalised with having to pay for new, costly and time-consuming printing plates because you’ve decided to update your graphics.

Then there are the colour swatches. You want your customers to be confident they are buying exactly the shade they want, because you know that if they open the can and find it’s just a little bit off, they won’t buy your brand again. For this you need accurate colour swatches. Our colour matching experts can accurately match the colour of your paints and our print team will include a matched swatch on the master label. This eliminates the need for a swatch to be created and applied to the can separately, and the extra time and cost associated with that. The same can be done for barcodes or any other type of information that the labels need to accommodate.

There is another way in which digital print can bring huge efficiencies for some companies, which many won’t even have considered. That is by removing the need to store cans. Because we print super high-quality labels, they can go straight on to the cans and straight to the distributor. Think about that for a moment. Straight to the distributor means no longer having to store thousands of paint cans on site and as such, removes the need for associated warehousing. Some of our clients who changed from traditional printing methods have made huge savings on print costs, but also because they were able to get rid of their storage costs too. Those efficiencies were achieved by a single action – changing from an analogue to a digital print supplier. There’s no way they would go back now.

So, with no need for MOQs, long set up times, printing plates, expensive storage solutions and wastage, digital print is turning the paint industry on its head. Isn’t it time you found a better way?

Want to know more about how Springfield Solutions can help revolutionise your paint business? Get in touch. Contact the Team on 01482 484700 or email solutions@springfieldsolutions.co.uk