The Eco-Benefits of Digital Printing

It doesn't matter how you say it - eco-friendly, carbon neutral, environmentally friendly, earth conscious, green, sustainable, or any number of other popular catch-phrases… it’s really all about the same thing.

Without a doubt being ‘green’ is very much front-of-mind these days, and rightly so, but while the attention being put on being green is very important (and completely overdue) there are many shrewd marketers and advertisers who will try to cash in on what they see as nothing more than the latest trend so you still need to be a discerning consumer.

Digital Printing - Cleaner and Greener

At DVDwest.ca we recognize our responsibility to be a good citizen, both in a corporate and global sense, so we have invested in the right equipment, processes and materials to provide the most sustainable and environmentally-friendly printing solutions as possible for our customers. Well over 90% of the print and packaging products for our DVD manufacturing and DVD duplication is printed in-house on state of the art digital printers, intentionally so, and for very good reason.

You see, the evolution of digital printing has revolutionized the printing industry. While traditional offset printing is considered an industrial process, digital printing is a computerized process which happens to be less wasteful and less demanding on resources compared to conventional print. In turn, less waste and less consumption equates to a more environmentally friendly method of printing which is beneficial for everyone... even a DVD manufacturing and DVD duplication company like us!

Digital printing has eliminated many stages of traditional printing that were time, energy and resource-consuming. This includes processes that were accompanied by liquid waste, solid waste and fumes - some of which actually require specialist treatment for disposal. Additionally, digital printing eliminates the use of chemistry for film and plate processing, as well as the substantial waste of materials used in the 'make ready' stage of offset printing.

The Efficiencies of Digital Printing

With an offset printer you cannot simply press a button and immediately begin printing. Time is required to prepare the machine to run a specific job which includes a lot of wasteful ‘test’ printing onto paper. This isn’t simply down-time for the machine as the time and expense of the make-ready process is passed through to the client in the cost of the finished goods.

With digital printing there isn’t any ‘make ready’ required and, due to this, digital printing allows for much shorter run lengths and quicker turnaround times. This aspect of digital printing is crucial for a company such as DVDwest.ca which provides short-run packaging solutions for our DVD manufacturing and DVD duplication services.

In particular, the shorter run lengths lead to less consumption and waste. It is estimated that prior to the advent of digital printing as much as 56% of all print was thrown away unused.

The Quality of Digital Printing

Talking about the benefits of digital printing is all well and good, but it’s a moot point if the digital printing produces inferior looking products. As previously mentioned, at DVDwest.ca we have invested in the equipment, processes and materials to do the job right. While most digital printers use dry toner our Indigo printers use liquid ink which reproduces the quality ‘look and feel’ of offset print. In most cases the colour and clarity of our digital print meets (if not actually exceeding) the quality of offset print and this is very important for our DVD manufacturing and DVD duplication packaging needs.