According to a PrintWeek report, wide-format printing is more or less where it was last year, with the majority of business coming from displays and banners, despite the difficult economic trading conditions.
Wide-format may be enjoying a spell in the limelight at the moment but, 12 months on from PrintWeek's last wideformat survey, it seems as if very little has changed in terms of buyers' attitudes towards the sector. Comparing last year's data to this year's, wide-format has climbed up the food chain a little with just over a quarter of the 150 buyer respondents stating that it accounts for 10 - 20% of their business, compared with 16% 12 months ago.
In terms of what sort of wide-format print this business consists of, the picture is also relatively unchanged, with banners, POP/POS displays and signs being the most common forms bought, with these usual suspects also identified as the sectors that are likely to represent the biggest growth areas for buyers.
But printers shouldn't exult just yet - feedback from buyers suggests that there is going to be little growth in terms of wide-format spend over the coming months. In the next six months, only 9% of buyers expect their spend to increase (versus 13% in 2009), with 19% of respondents stating that their spend will increase in the next 12 months against 24% last year. There are some crumbs of comfort to be taken from the two-year figure, which shows 10% of buyers expecting to spend more (versus 7% in 2009) but the two-to-five-year figure is down slightly - 4% from 5% in 2009.
Two new questions shed light on the typical print runs specified by buyers. Somewhat unsurprisingly the majority of jobs (66%) consist of fewer than 50 sheets, with 16.7% of run lengths being 50 - 150 sheets, but after that it's much of a muchness with jobs of 150 - 250, 250 - 400 and 400 and more sheets all accounting for 5% apiece.
The data also suggests that there's little cheer for manufacturers. While marginally more (3% versus 2% in 2009) of the 300 printers stated their intention to bring wideformat printing in-house in the next six months, fewer are looking to follow suit in the next 12 months (6% against 7% in 2009) and fewer still in the 12 months after that (5% against 8% in 2009). A slight glimmer of hope is offered by the 8% - up from 5% in 2009 - of printers who intend to bring wideformat printing in-house in the next five years.
Other trends include continued growth in demand for POP/ POS displays and banners, which corresponds with buyer feedback, with POP/POS displays providing the single biggest area of wide-format growth - 29% of printers polled stated this to be the case against 20% in 2009.
And perhaps there's an early indicator that the slowly improving economic climate is allowing printers to make better margins for themselves as 42% of them reported that wide-format printing is currently a more profitable activity than other services they offer (in 2009 the figure stood at 36%). On the flip side, the perceived profitability of wideformat among buyers dipped slightly, with 14% (16% in 2009) stating it's more profitable than other types of print that they buy.
Printweek magazine
www.printweek.com
