This booth graphic with printable carpet by ABI Digital Solutions, Conroe, Texas, extends the theme and creates the illusion of a cobblestone walkway. (Photo courtesy ABI Digital Solutions)

The prolonged economic downturn has certainly taken a bite out of the trade show business (and business in general), but successful print shops bite back by expanding their product portfolio. They may not make for all the volume they lose when times are tough, but having something to add to their core business keeps production going.
ABI Digital Solutions in Conroe, Texas, adopted this approach from the beginning, solidifying its position in the market with an almost endless stream of both standard and specialty products. One of ABI’s long-standing specialty print products has been imaged carpets.

SHOP PERSPECTIVE
ABI started printing carpet in 1999 on its VUTEk 5300 solvent printer. Though printer manufacturers cringe every time someone runs commercial carpet through their machines, ABI was able to find commercial carpet with a low enough thread length and they adjusted their printer accordingly.
Carpet printing didn’t harm the printheads, says Damon Henrichs, ABI’s director of sales and client education services, but it did require additional maintenance and special printhead height settings. Plus, there was a fair amount of waste since the VUTEk 5300 and 5330 units needed more leading and trailing material for a successful print.
ABI switched carpet printing projects to its VUTEk UV-curing flatbed about four years ago. While solvent inks soak deeper into the threads, providing better durability, the UV-curable inks produce greater brilliance and color reproduction, says Henrichs. Moreover, there’s much less waste on the flatbed printer.

With carpet prints from the UV press, the ink sits on the surface of the threads so the blacks are blacker and the color is more brilliant,” Henrichs says. “We’re printing on a low-level loop carpet with a 1/4” pile that we get from a commercial supplier called Emerald Carpet. We’re using an untreated commercial carpet; you want raw goods or materials designed for inkjet printing because a treated carpet does not work with the ink. It’s a low-grade carpet that’s meant for trade shows or special events where the client is most likely to use it once, or maybe a time or two more.”

Why not make a gigantic game board out of printable carpet? This Monopoly board is an excellent example of using printable carpet to draw attendees to an interactive sales opportunity. The project was printed on Ultraflex’s UltraCarpet Extra. (Photo courtesy Ultraflex)

Henrichs reports that the majority of ABI’s carpet printing is for trade show applications, sold to both exhibitors and the exhibition producers. “We get some clients who’ve seen pictures of what we’ve done on carpet who want to use it for their office,” Henrichs says. “We turn them away from that application because it’s not meant for that type of usage and durability.”

WALL-TO-WALL
While ABI has been using raw commercial carpet for its printer, there are printable carpet products available engineered specifically for inkjet printing, such as those offered by Ultraflex (www.ultraflexx.com), Printingcarpets.com, Bob Mats (www.bobmats.com) and Flex America (flex-america.biz).

There’s also an inkjet printer manufactured in Europe engineered specifically for carpet printing that provides greater durability and higher production capabilities (www.carpet.namatec.com). The ChromoJet printer series is also touted for printing blankets, upholstery, corduroy, fur, terry cloth towels and other “high pile” products.

“The ChromoJet print line is a more complex operation in comparison to a typical wide-format digital printer, so prices range from $500,000 to several million USD, depending on capacity,” says Tony Naschberger of Namatec. Naschberger adds that the prints are very durable, like any industrial-dyed carpet, and will last for years.

Printable carpet puts the finishing touch on thematic graphics from top to bottom, as illustrated by Ultraflex’s booth at Graphics Canada 2009. (Photo courtesy Ultraflex)

Freeman, a trade show exhibition company based in Chicago, uses Ultraflex’s printable UltraCarpet Extra product for many of its projects. Freeman uses its VUTEk 5300 for carpet printing. Though Freeman has six new printers, they’re used for higher-quality production printing on banners and other materials.

“We used to print a thicker carpet, and then Ultraflex came out with a thinner carpet, which really helped. The pile is not as deep; it’s a business-like thin carpet. And, it doesn’t have as much coating on the backside so it goes through the printer easily,” says Michael Hidden, Freeman’s corporate graphics manager. “The color gamut is about half of what we can get on a banner material, particularly with reds, because the pile soaks up the color. Still, our clients are amazed by it and we’ve done entire booths in wood grain, cobblestone and pavement looks, in addition to all kinds of logos and other graphics. It also works well for aisle directionals in place of hanging banners.”

DEMAND IN WAVES
Hidden says that demand is an unpredictable “roller coaster ride” that comes in waves, like a lot of other specialty printing applications. It’s sold as a value-added service that provides Freeman’s clients with a full suite of options.
“Over the last three weeks we’ve had a run on carpet logos and the three weeks before that we didn’t print any carpet. We keep at least 20 rolls in stock just in case we get a show that has to have the aisle signs in the carpet. In that case we’ll print about 50 10 x 10s,” says Hidden.

Though trade show applications are by far the most popular, printable carpet is also an excellent solution for special events and short-term point-of-purchase projects. The key phrase here is “short term” since the image wears away relatively quickly with high traffic. While it can handle the foot traffic and after-hours maintenance of a typical trade show, anything beyond that is pushing the limits of its durability.

ABI Digital Solutions prints carpet for both show producers and exhibitors. This entryway carpet graphic for the Food Marketing Institute reinforces the Institute’s brand. (Photo courtesy ABI Digital Solutions)

“The No. 1 challenge is setting expectations because it is a very short-term product and needs to be sold that way. So you have to let the customer know that it’s purely a promotional product,” says Chuck Meservey, VUTEk’s demo manager. “Our customers do a lot of sampling beforehand. As much R&D as you put into it, there will still be some color differences. It can be a difficult media to work with because you just don’t get the same color gamut and pop as you do with other media, so you won’t always get a perfect match with the surrounding graphics.”

ANOTHER SOLUTION
Because of its durability and weight issues (carpet is heavier than most print media, particularly if you use commercial carpet) longer-term applications may require a floor decal solution, such as those manufactured by 3M and Avery. The choice between a direct-print and a decal application is usually clear-cut based on the project’s parameters.
Freeman’s Hidden prefers floor decals for wood and concrete surfaces. The bulk of Freeman’s carpet applications are direct-print. However, Hidden says if shipping weight and longevity for repeat and long-term applications are concerns, then floor decals designed for carpet applications are another good choice.

ABI’s booth at ISA is a clever combination of theming and eye-catching graphics. ABI prints the bulk of its carpet with its VUTEk flatbed UV-curable printer on a low-grade commercial carpet. (Photo courtesy ABI Digital Solutions)

FINISHING
Finishing direct-print carpet is straightforward: trim and install it with double-stick carpet tape. “One of our customers used a bunch of direct-print carpet for the Grammys at one of the after-hours events sponsored by Lincoln,” says Jay LoCicero, director of sales for Ultraflex Systems. “That was a little different because they printed smaller pieces that they sent out to a local carpet place to put a hem on it. Other customers have found that it’s fairly simple to use a local carpet company for the hems, when required. However, the vast majority of the carpet sold requires no finishing because it’s for full edge-to-edge floor coverings and is butt-seamed and stuck to the floor with double-stick tape.”