Print Solutions
In the last 18 months everything has come together very nicely for Pierre Pheiffer, the owner and managing director at Xtreme Signs and Graphics. This Dublin based digital wide format print provider has installed two new digital 3.2 metre production quality printers, and ditched his old preferred materials in favour of Pongs Direct-Tex SoftImage Contrast Black Back textile.
Pierre was introduced to the substrate by Joel Willcock, textile business development specialist CMYUK. He said, ‘I tested a roll and to be honest I have never looked back.
‘With the last material we were using from another manufacturer, we had a success rate of about 60% a roll, but with Pongs Contrast we pretty much use over 95%.’
The company spends 50% of its time servicing the exhibition market and the rest producing general signage including retail and corporate work. In the last two years, it has seen a significant shift in this market sector, and now outputs 70% of textile to 30% board, but says Pierre, ‘I can see that migrating over as well.’
So, what is it that Pierre loves about Pongs Contrast?
‘We supply print to a lot of modular systems with silicon edge on it, we find the quality of it absolutely superb. When you unfold it when its been rolled up in a bundle, and you stretch it back out over the frames, within five minutes all the bruising and all the creases become like a graphic you have just printed two minutes ago,’ he explained.
‘The partners who work with us undertake exhibitions all over Europe, so a lot of our print travels all around Europe and sometimes beyond,’ Pierre continued. ‘Textile is an excellent traveller, light and convenient, you can fold it up into a small box and send it off. If you print on boards they are so much bulkier, more difficult and expensive to transport, prone to damage and present storage problems. Pongs Contrast also creates a lovely seamless effect. Textile is becoming the de facto standard.’
For the other 50% of the business – general wide format signage, retail and corporate – Pierre has been very proactive in getting the substrate in front of clients, and the retailers in particular are lapping it up. ‘We are really pushing the Pongs Contrast here, now so we have a nice frame that we use with silicon edge for wall graphics. A lot more retail companies are buying this because of the benefits of putting up a frame once, and changing the silicon edge every three to six months,’ he said.
