Accelerated reliable speeds and colour fidelity are a must for this online roller banner, popup stand, and feather flag trade services print supplier
featherflagstrade.co.uk, a new online trade services business has invested in a Canon Colorado 1630 UV LED printer from CMYUK. It was purchased to enable lightning speed turnaround of roller banners and popup stands. Set-up last year, the business guarantees 48-hour turnaround times for its feather flags, and next day delivery for all roller banner orders received by 11.00 am.
The Canon Colorado 1630 was purchased on the advice of several trade contacts who were familiar with the UV-gel printer, and very happy with its speed, reliability, and colour fidelity. “Everyone we spoke to who owned a Colorado said that they were amazing. When we finally went for a demonstration at CMYUK, it was in a different league to what we were used to – just fantastic,” says Josh Candy, Director, featherflagstrade.co.uk.
Josh has worked with CMYUK since 2013 – initially buying material trims for feather flags. “I always knew that when the day came for me to directly purchase production equipment, CMYUK would be first on the list. When I rang up about the Colorado, a demonstration was arranged in no time, with delivery and installation following within a week and a half, which was very gratifying,” he says.
Speed and colour
The company chose the Canon Colorado 1630 that offers a resolution of up to 1800dpi and print speeds of up to 111sq.m per hour. A smart option for users looking for versatility, this printer can be configured to today’s needs but upgraded retrospectively as volumes increase.
In addition to fast reliable speed, Josh is extremely pleased with the Colorado’s colour reproduction widely acknowledged for its consistency, precise, sharp dots, wide colour gamut, and strong saturation for dark colours as well as accurate skin tones.
“With this printer we have full confidence that you can put the artwork through and just press the Print button. I’ve not had one customer complain once about colour fidelity, which is really impressive,” he says.
Boosted productivity
Productivity is pivotal to the Colorado’s design. Unattended printing, fuss-free job switching, reduced ink and energy requirements are big-draw features of this printer, while printhead reliability, and low maintenance ensure maximum production uptime.
One of Josh’s favourite aspects of the Colorado is its dual rolls – that allows him to print 850mm wide roller banners on one, and then 2 x up on the second roll. “It just makes life really easy. We prefeed both and select which roll we’re going to use and just press print. It has made our throughput much faster and efficient. It’s just fantastic,” he says.
The Colorado too, has come into its own for the printing of magnetic popup stands. In the past the company would print these off on its HP Latex printer, laminate, add magnetic strips, and then cut. Now thanks to the Colorado the process is much quicker. “Now we output on the Colorado, cut them and then add the magnetic strips. Colorado prints are so scratch resistant – you can put them on the floor, stand on them, pick them back up, wipe them down, and there’s no scratches on them. To be fair – it’s unreal,” says Josh.
While the Colorado has the capacity to handle multiple jobs and a wide range of roll materials – including thin and heat sensitive up to 64-ins wide – on a single device, for featherflagstrade.co.uk, this printer will be dedicated in the main to what it was purchased for.
Says Josh, “We’re not planning to do anything else with it. We like to stick to what we’re good at and do lots of it. Before installing the Canon Colorado 1630 we were at full capacity, now we could do an extra 100 or so roll banners easily if we wanted to. Our printing is now done in the morning, and we don’t have to worry about the afternoon. It’s made my life much less stressful. It’s just very easy.”
