It was 15 years ago that Ricoh first became Heidelberg’s supplier of choice for digital print engines. Heidelberg has in the years since sold 3,500 of the Linoprint and Versafire machines, underlining the importance of digital printing to Heidelberg and the way that the press manufacturer can open doors that Ricoh cannot reach. It was a surprise to the Japanese company then that when choosing an inkjet press partner, Heideberg opted for Canon, but at that point Ricoh could not offer an SRA3 inkjet press as Canon has, nor does it seem as if Ricoh is ready to risk toner press sales by developing smaller format inkjet.
At that launch event Bernhard Schreier, then Heidelberg’s CEO, explained how litho and digital would complement each other using direct mail for a fictitious golf resort as an example. Without digital printing the customer would receive a direct mail piece with a litho printed brochure and separate digitally printed letter. In the future, he explained, the litho brochure might include a digital element, namely photos taken in the previous year when the customer enjoyed a golfing break at the resort with a group of friends. That personal element would be more likely to win a new booking he claimed. It remains a fictious case study as we never found out where the photos would come from, still less the databasing and workflow that would be necessary to achieve the product. Mere trifles.
But Schreier and his team had hit on something. It is the emotional impact of print. Print as a souvenir to unlock memories of a great time, playing golf, or as has happened this year, attending a football match, albeit at Vicarage Road, with a post match programme including photos to prove ‘I was there’. The opportunities to use print in this way are endless, a more sophisticated version of the photo you buy after a theme park ride. This is why many still collect football programmes or hold on to the printed ticket stubs of long ago concerts from bands that have long since broken up. Nobody keeps an email as a souvenir or retains the digital ticket that you scan to get in to an event. In an increasingly digital age, only print can do this.
Remember what only print can do
It was 15 years ago that Ricoh first became Heidelberg’s supplier of choice for digital print engines. Heidelberg has in the years since sold 3,500 of the Linoprint and Versafire machines, underlining the importance of digital printing to Heidelberg and the way that the press manufacturer can open doors that Ricoh cannot reach. It was a surprise to the Japanese company then that when choosing an inkjet press partner, Heideberg opted for Canon, but at that point Ricoh could not offer an SRA3 inkjet press as Canon has, nor does it seem as if Ricoh is ready to risk toner press sales by developing smaller format inkjet.
At that launch event Bernhard Schreier, then Heidelberg’s CEO, explained how litho and digital would complement each other using direct mail for a fictitious golf resort as an example. Without digital printing the customer would receive a direct mail piece with a litho printed brochure and separate digitally printed letter. In the future, he explained, the litho brochure might include a digital element, namely photos taken in the previous year when the customer enjoyed a golfing break at the resort with a group of friends. That personal element would be more likely to win a new booking he claimed. It remains a fictious case study as we never found out where the photos would come from, still less the databasing and workflow that would be necessary to achieve the product. Mere trifles.
But Schreier and his team had hit on something. It is the emotional impact of print. Print as a souvenir to unlock memories of a great time, playing golf, or as has happened this year, attending a football match, albeit at Vicarage Road, with a post match programme including photos to prove ‘I was there’. The opportunities to use print in this way are endless, a more sophisticated version of the photo you buy after a theme park ride. This is why many still collect football programmes or hold on to the printed ticket stubs of long ago concerts from bands that have long since broken up. Nobody keeps an email as a souvenir or retains the digital ticket that you scan to get in to an event. In an increasingly digital age, only print can do this.
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