In recent years, the popularity of UV flatbed printing equipment has led to a change in the coloring process for acrylic products. Traditional screen printing has gradually decreased, while UV color printing, with its flexibility, low cost, and high pattern reproduction, has become the preferred coloring solution for the majority of customers. In the past, bulk acrylic signs and display frames were mostly colored using screen printing. Screen printing required the separate creation of screens, and changing the design meant resetting the screen, resulting in high sampling costs and making it suitable only for large orders of a single design with thousands of pieces. However, nowadays, customers demand customized styles with diverse patterns, and small-batch, multi-style orders are the norm. Screen printing struggles to meet market demands.
UV printing does not require creating screens; designs can be directly imported into the equipment for printing. A single sheet of material or just a few samples can be processed directly, with extremely low sampling costs and higher color reproduction. Gradations, portraits, and complex cartoon patterns can all be clearly presented. Additionally, applying a gloss finish can create a浮雕 (relief) effect, enriching the visual layers of the product. Printing on both sides of transparent acrylic and color printing on matte boards can be easily achieved, with far greater adaptability in terms of craftsmanship compared to traditional screen printing.
Initially, the procurement cost of UV printing equipment was high, and only large processing factories could afford it. However, the price of the equipment has now decreased, and most standard acrylic processing factories have introduced UV flatbed printers, leading to a comprehensive upgrade in the industry's coloring process. After comparing the two processes, customers are more inclined to choose UV printing, even if the unit processing cost is slightly higher than screen printing, as it eliminates screen-making costs, resulting in lower overall costs for multi-style small-batch orders.
Screen printing is now only used sparingly for ultra-large bulk orders of single-color signs, while most custom products are now colored using UV color printing. At the same time, customer demands for printing quality have increased, moving beyond simple monochrome text to include more complex requirements such as gradients,浮雕 (relief) effects, and matte finishes. This is driving factories to upgrade to large-format, high-precision UV equipment and配套 (matching) eco-friendly inks to enhance the fineness of the printed images.
In terms of market competition, small workshops that can only perform screen printing and lack UV printing equipment have seen a continuous decline in orders. Customers now prioritize factories with their own UV printing workshops and one-stop processing capabilities. For physical processing factories, UV color printing has become a basic配套 (supporting) process, and lacking this equipment makes it difficult to handle the current mainstream custom orders. Dongguan Shangsheng Acrylic is equipped with multiple industrial UV printing machines,设有无尘打印车间 (has a dust-free printing workshop), supporting浮雕 (relief), double-sided color printing, and various other processes. Without outsourcing printing, they can process the entire production process autonomously, better controlling color, delivery schedules, and product quality, aligning with the current industry's mainstream process development trends.
The industry widely believes that UV printing will continue to dominate the coloring process of acrylic in the future, and various composite light oil processes will constantly innovate, enriching the expressive forms of acrylic finished products.
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