Like many players in the North American printing industry, EFI and Brett Martin welcomed the return of PRINTING United Expo 2022. The Las Vegas expo gave the companies another valuable opportunity for a winning collaboration — with EFI printing two of Brett Martin’s rigid substrates on two of its wide-format printers.
EFI showcased a breadth of products, including the EFI VUTEk h5 hybrid flatbed/roll-fed LED inkjet printer suitable for industrial scale, high-volume printing and the EFI Pro 30h hybrid LED inkjet printer, an entry level production device with excellent print quality. This year, the company chose to use Brett Martin’s Foamalux Ultra, a foam PVC available in seven colors which has a co-extruded gloss surface and Foamalux Eco, a black foam PVC which contains up to 80% reclaimed foam PVC regrind content. Using EFI's white ink — the industry’s leading white ink in brightness and opacity — under CMYK inks on the hybrid printers at PRINTING United enabled brilliant, superior color results on the black and colored Brett Martin rigid substrates.
Tiffany Bisson, manager at EFI’s Customer Experience Centre in the U.S., explains why these Brett Martin products were chosen: “Having a high-quality substrate is extremely important to us when we are demonstrating our equipment at exhibitions or in our Customer Experience Centre. We want to be certain that we are not going to encounter unexpected issues by using lower quality substrates which could detract from the performance of our printers. Brett Martin’s products meet our requirements perfectly as we always know that they will print well. By using Foamalux Ultra and Foamalux Eco, rather than the more common white substrates, we added extra interest to the end print.
“The red gloss surface of the Foamalux Ultra acted as a frame around the print area and echoed the glitz that surrounded us during our time in Las Vegas. Foamalux Eco allowed us to demonstrate that substrates containing a high percentage of non-virgin foam PVC can give a very smooth, printable surface. The pattern we chose to print on the Foamalux Eco left the black scales of the fish unprinted to show the original surface of the substrate.
“We also took the opportunity to demonstrate how the combination of the quality of Brett Martin’s substrate and the precision of our printing equipment allows us to print letters as small as three point.”
The companies’ ongoing collaboration is part of Brett Martin’s Approved Partner Programme. The Northern Ireland-based plastics manufacturer works closely with printing, cutting, and thermoforming machine manufacturers to test and showcase the processing capabilities of its semi-finished product portfolio.
Mark Robinson, Brett Martin’s sales manager for the USA and Canada, explains, “We always enjoy working with EFI. Our collaboration allows us to ensure that our products can be successfully processed on the printing equipment our customers use. Through these collaborations, we can ensure that our products are continuously evolving and performing to the highest standards and kept up to date with the latest technology advances.”