Recently, we were contacted by a local company to print a banner for one of their retractable banner signs. Another sign company printed the banner. They were not happy with the results because the colors did not match their other signs, and the print quality was inferior. One great advantage to retractable (or pop-up) banners is that you can replace the banner if you don’t like the sign, without having to buy a new retractable stand. No need to buy a new retractable stand!
In the image below, you will see two samples. The one in the top-left corner is the one we printed to replace the old banner. At first glace, you immediately notice differences in print quality, consistency of the ink, and boldness of color. You will also notice faded, inconsistent color and severe banding that was produced by the other sign company.
With our large format printer, we can print high quality images on high quality surfaces. But so can other printers and sign companies. Even with similar equipment, sometimes a printer will have trouble getting the right colors from a file. For example, if a printer uses the wrong file type, the colors won’t print as they should. If you don’t have the Pantone color code for the colors in your images, the colors may reproduce differently than you expect. But, we have a tool that we use to ensure the colors match a client’s file on a specific substrate, even if our client does not have their Pantone color codes.
We use a device called a Spectrophotometer, and it helps us to color match. Our prints come straight from the file that our client provides, and then we print it with amazing quality no matter what the substrate is — a banner, vehicle wrap vinyl, decals, wallpaper, fabric, canvas, and more – because we profile all of our print materials. Many printers use generic online profiles that may or may not be appropriate for their particular printer.
Color is important to us, and we know it’s important to our clients. We produce photo quality prints for our signs, banners, vehicle graphics and more. If you care about print quality and color matching, call Reflection Signs and Graphics to discuss the appropriate questions to ask when comparing sign companies. It could save you a lot of time and money!
Written by: Reflection Signs & Graphics – Westminster, CO
