Views from drupa: Offset Quality Delivered Through Inkjet Technology

Last week, Printing Impressions traveled to Düsseldorf, Germany, to attend drupa 2024. While on the show floor, we caught up with a few U.S.-based print service providers to find out what brought them to the show, how they viewed the event, and what technology or applications they were most excited to see. This is just one of those stories.

Printing Impressions: How many drupas have you been to?

John Falconetti: This is my third visit to drupa. The first was 2012, and it was really special for me because coming to drupa was always this experience that my father had looked forward to. I'm a third-generation printer, so being able to come over here for both of our first visits in 2012 was extraordinary; very exciting.

I returned in 2016 with our senior management team. This time, I'm here with my new chief operating officer. We're really excited about looking at the new and emerging technology that continues to redefine our industry in so many ways.

John Falconetti, chairman and CEO, Drummond

PI: What are your thoughts on this year's exhibition?

JF: What I love to see is the continuation of the enthusiasm and extraordinary research and development that we continue to see in our industry. I think sometimes that gets lost on folks, but coming and seeing the passion, the size, and the impact from all of these exhibitors is just so refreshing and energizing. Now, with that being said, we've seen inkjet technology really evolve over the last 12 years. I really look not just at the delivery in terms of inkjet web versus cut-sheet, but also the quality. It's just extraordinary.

We're living in a day and age of offset quality being delivered through inkjet technology, which I don't know if any of us thought would happen 12 years ago.

PI: Have you seen any technology or applications here that have excited you?

JF: It's almost at every single turn. Our business is built on a few different platforms: direct mail, visual merchandising, wide-format applications, and packaging. So, as we visit the different areas of focus, we're seeing quality that's going through the roof.

Drummond is very thankful and blessed for the level of revenue growth that we've experienced over the years. So what we're committed to is: How do we continue to focus on time-to-market, which we know is so valuable in the marketplace today? How do we continue to improve our time-to-market and at the same time absorb the kind of revenue growth that we're seeing?

In some ways, we've just got to keep up with the new and emerging technology that may not make that possible today, but it'll make it possible tomorrow.