Digital printing is beginning to play a key role in reviving the sliding sales of wallcoverings. Industry participants believe that mass customization, reduced inventory, and the ability to produce new designs resulting in higher mark-ups on their products will revitalize an industry that's mired in sluggish sales. In fact, I.T. Strategies estimates that the wallcoverings industry, which is estimated to be worth $1.5 billion in the US in 1999, could grow to $1.7 billion by 2004, driven by digital printing technology. While the traditional wallcovering industry is declining about 3% per year, digital printing has the ability to revive the market.

"Digital printing is becoming a competitive advantage to manufacturers and distributors," said Mark Hanley, president of I.T. Strategies. "It is only a matter of time before digital printing becomes pervasive in the wallcoverings industry, especially as new print technologies are developed that are targeted specifically at the industry's printing requirements."

According to Rob Haak, Managing Director of Barco Industrial Printing, "The wallcoverings industry will certainly benefit from the new technological developments for the production of short-run and customized products. Time to market and flexibility are requirements in every step of the wallcoverings supply chain -- from design, digitally-printed samples and product variations, product selection thru the Internet, to the final customized digital print production."

"One of the major factors contributing to Wallcovering Industry business morass is simply inventory velocity," said said Barry Meyers,, Managing Director of Digital Printing Systems. The law of supply and demand is working in a classical sense to cause price and, inevitably, profit erosion. High-speed digital printing presses coming on the market from dedicated sources such as DPS can and will help to virtually eliminate excess inventory going forward. Short, precise print runs that produce only what is needed to prime the pipeline for new collections will go a long way to eliminating negative inventory velocity."

The Challenges

Using existing offset printing methods, wallcoverings companies face several limitations and challenges. These include large inventory to keep popular patterns in stock, short pattern repeats, and time-consuming and costly image-preparation process.
Clearly, one of the largest challenges to growth in the wallcoverings industry is very high inventory costs. Distributors must stockpile literally hundreds of styles, patterns, and raw materials and store them in climate-controlled environments. These storage requirements are coupled with low inventory turnover rate. Today, approximately 80 percent of purchased wallpaper comes from just 20 percent of the designs in inventory. This has made the wallcoverings industry very cost-conscious. With digital printing, suppliers can store patterns and designs electronically and print as needed. The digital system also offers the added benefit of customization and personalization.
Pattern limitations inherent to current printing technology hinder wallcoverings designers, and this also stunts the growth of the industry. Without variety and innovation in wallcoverings imagery, customers are not as likely to invest in this type of decor. Therefore, the need for new, innovative designs is a clear opportunity for wallcoverings suppliers. Today, with traditional printing methods in mind, designs for new patterns and colors are being created for as far ahead as 2005. Artists must predict the colors that will best fit the decorating styles five years in the future. Digital wallcoverings provide the freedom for design professionals to create designs customers want, and order just the amount they need when they need it.

The Players

Three key manufacturers are exploring and setting the stage for large-scale digital printing of wallcoverings. They include Barco, DPS, and STC.

Barco is one of the world's leading high-end imaging display and pre-press companies. Recently, they set out to develop a product specification that would enable its industrial customers to use the substrates that they were accustomed to (such as wallcoverings), the types of inks the industry was familiar with, provided the speed customers required, and produced output quality similar to traditional printing. In addition Barco required a technology capable of printing continuously changing images. At DRUPA, Barco announced its the.factory (pronounced the dot factory); an ultra-high-speed ink jet printer using UV-curable inks that are intended to print on the customers commonly used substrates. A total wallcovering digital print workflow solution, including multi-channel separation, variable data handling, color management and the.factory, is priced between $1 million - $1.5 million depending on configuration. Barco has already taken several deposits for the system that will ship in early 2001. Barco is taking a well-calculated pioneering position in the industrial digital printing market, one that will change not only its own business but will add tremendous value to its customer's business.

Digital Printing Systems (DPS) is an outgrowth of Polytex, the leading worldwide ink supplier to the wallcoverings industry. DPS is a new organization which is aligning itself with ink jet hardware developers as well as chemistry and software companies to develop its own print head technology. It has teamed up with Aprion and Jemtex, and also has worked with two textile industry technology developers, Ciba Specialty Chemicals and Sophis Systems. Currently, DPS offers two products: 1)the DPS65, a drop-on-demand, piezo ink jet printer from Aprion, which is a roll-to-roll printer that can print up to 2000 sq. ft./hour at 600 dpi.; and 2) the DPS75T, a continuous ink jet textile proofer with a 72 image width, based on technology from Jemtex. The printer is a sheet-fed machine capable of printing up to three 48-inch by 74-inch sheets per hour directly on fabric.

Specialty Toner Corporation (STC), which began in 1986 as a supplier of toner for electrostatic printers and plotters, now produces consumables to help its customers better utilize their equipment by focusing on applications such as wallcoverings. In 1999, STC introduced its V Color Printing System which was the first printing system to use more than 4 colors to create high-quality images on very productive electrostatic printers.

Digital printing will eventually garner more interest among wallcoverings suppliers. Its key advantages include greater freedom during design and manufacturing, reduction of inventory, and less risk of purchasing and carrying patterns that do not sell well. Especially for customized, short-run printing, the digital alternative should prove to be a very viable and profitable solution.

I.T. Strategies, Inc. is an established research and consultancy firm dedicated to serving companies in emerging digital printing markets. The company delivers intelligent data, analysis, strategy, and implementation practices to vendors in the digital printing industry around the world.