Turning to digital at Action Quality Printers

Turning to digital at Action Quality Printers

The story of how Action Quality Printers became a full-service label printer in 1998 is one that’s still being played out regularly in the industry today: a commercial printer sees a mature market, eyes growth in the label and package printing segment and decides to take a leap. 

‘We needed to hitch our wagon to something that was in more of a growth market,’ says president and general manager Kevin Curtain. ‘Packaging and labels seemed to be a pretty good fit. Everything I was seeing and reading was that label and packaging had the potential for long-term growth in the printing industry, so I made the decision to move in that direction.’

This was 20 years ago, but it could have been said today. 

Technology  Boise, Idaho-based Action Quality Printers began as an offset shop in 1968. The company first installed a Webtron press when it moved to the label segment in the late 1990s. Within three years, the company had divested itself of its commercial printing assets and was pegged as Idaho’s leading locally-owned label manufacturer. 

Action Quality Printers ran an all-flexo shop until 2016 when the company acquired a 13-inch Epson SurePress L-4033AW press and entered the digital label market. 

Curtain says the Epson press was affordable, robust enough to match the quality Action’s customers had come to expect, and versatile enough to serve the label converter’s diverse client base. 

Curtain says: ‘It fit our market perfectly because of the price point – it was a more affordable option than we were previously had been able to find. And when I made a visit to the demo center down in California and saw the capabilities of the equipment, and how it fit in with what were we’re trying to achieve, it was a really good fit for us.’

The company also has four 8-color flexo presses. Digital finishing is done on a semi-rotary die-cutting machine from Brotech, and Curtain cites Label Traxx and Esko workflow as key to his business success. 

Local market  Boise, Idaho, has a population of 226,000 people, so Action Quality Printers worried that the local economy couldn’t support labels on its digital asset. The company estimated the return on its investment would be reached in 12 to 18 months. It made it in three. 

‘Digital for us makes sense. Because we are in a smaller economic pool, there are many smaller-sized companies and startups who have small run jobs but want high quality and quicker turnaround times. For that, digital makes sense,’ Curtain explains.

‘We’re in a small market, we don’t have many large manufacturing facilities that are using millions of labels,’ Curtain says. ‘We’re focused on the local economy: the beer, wine and specialty food markets.’

The company is now printing 80 percent conventionally and 20 percent digitally. It has 17 employees and has increased sales revenue by 35 percent since installing its digital equipment. 

‘I think digital is going to continue to grasp more and more market share because of versatility and because of number of vendors supplying machinery out there.’ 

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