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Step into the world of UV printing with Lon Riley, founder of DPI Laboratory, as he reveals how this rapidly evolving technology is transforming personalization across industries. Unlike traditional printing methods, UV printing instantly cures ink with ultraviolet light, making products immediately ready for handling or shipping—a game-changer for on-demand production.
What began as a specialty ink company has evolved into a full-service printing solution provider, with DPI Laboratory now offering two printer models tailored to different market needs. The compact Catalyst Nanos delivers professional-grade UV printing at an accessible price point for small businesses, while the larger Catalyst Aventra, with its triple printhead configuration, satisfies high-volume production demands with sophisticated white ink and varnish capabilities.
The true magic of UV printing lies in its remarkable versatility. Photographers can expand beyond traditional prints to offer images on virtually any surface. Promotional product businesses can deliver everything from personalized golf balls to custom tumblers. Event venues can even bring printers on-site for real-time merchandise customization. As Riley explains, "You can produce a very high-quality photo at two feet by three feet, or you can put a face on a Lego minifigure."
From sports memorabilia with game dates and scores to concert merchandise created on demand, consumers increasingly seek personalized products that transform branded items into meaningful keepsakes. With exceptional print quality, improved durability, and sophisticated workflow integration, UV printing is positioned to meet this demand while opening new revenue streams for businesses across multiple industries.
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Hosted and produced by Gary Pageau
Edited by Olivia Pageau
Announcer: Erin Manning
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Erin Manning (00:02):
Welcome to the Dead Pixel Society podcast, the
photo imaging industry's leadingnews source.
Here's your host, Gary Pageau.
The Dead Pixels Society podcastis brought to you by Mediaclip,
Advertek Printing andIndependent Photo Imagers.
Gary Pageau (00:18):
Hello again and welcome to the Dead Pixels
Society podcast.
I'm your host, Gary Pageau, andtoday we're joined by Lon Riley
, who's the founder of DPILaboratory, and he's coming to
us from St Petersburg, Florida,today.
Hey Lon, how are you today?
Lon Riley (00:31):
Hey, Gary, I'm doing.
Great Thanks for having me.
I appreciate it.
Gary Pageau (00:33):
So you're a relatively new company in the UV
printing space.
So for the people who don'tknow what UV printing is, let's
start there and how you got thecompany started.
Lon Riley (00:45):
Sure, UV printing is basically a form of printing
that uses a UV curable ink.
So when the people that arefamiliar with inks that normally
have to air dry or water-basedinks, the difference is when the
UV ink jets on a surface, theUV light immediately goes over,
it cross-links the monomers andit cures immediately.
So once you uh jet onto asubstrate it's immediately ready
(01:06):
to use package send.
So it's a relatively newertechnology.
It's been around for some years.
Uh continued to advance overthe last four or five years,
gained a lot of traction and uh.
You know markets such assignage, uh, promotional
products, of course, award andtrophy uh and photography crowd.
Gary Pageau (01:28):
Yeah, and that's kind of what I want to talk
about a little bit, becauseyou've got some printers coming
out and we'll talk about thatlater.
But you know how long has thecompany been around?
What is the technicalfoundation?
What is your kind of yourunique value that you're
bringing to the market?
Lon Riley (01:39):
We started the company early last year really
based around the uv inks andcoatings.
So we do some specialtycoatings.
They're uv cured for largerprint bar applications,
manufacturing and package typeapplications, do embellishment
and special techniques, glosscoats and things like that.
That's where we started.
After we kind of ran the tradeshow circuit last year, had a
(02:03):
number of former vendors, formerpartners, approach us about
doing a UV line.
We started looking at it andfound some gaps in the industry
and we thought there was a goodplace in the industry for a
really well-built machine that'sat a lower price point than you
typically see but packaged withtop software and then, of
course, with our inks that weformulate here as well.
(02:24):
So a good opportunity to puttogether an all-inclusive
package that would create a lotof value, give customers a lot
of those features that younormally would only see reserved
for much larger, more expensivemachines, but in something
that's more approachable herefor the SMB market.
Gary Pageau (02:40):
So you started really on.
The supply side is the inks anddo you formulate your own?
Is that your own, likeformulations that you've got?
Lon Riley (02:48):
It is we work with a manufacturer, of course.
So we do a lot of work with themanufacturer with specific
things Like we've recentlyreleased a security ink, so it's
a basically like a fluorescentcomponent to a gloss, so you can
jet it on anything and it'srelatively invisible until you
shine a black light on it.
So it's used for things like.
(03:10):
We have a number of customersthat are in the promotional
product space.
They do things like Christmasornaments.
They were using black QR codesto label their products and now
they're able to basically putthat product stamp on invisibly.
But they can still get thebenefit of the automation from
their QR systems, but they don'thave that big old black QR code
(03:31):
hanging out anymore.
Gary Pageau (03:32):
Okay, so it's more pleasing and the appearance is
better.
Lon Riley (03:37):
Agreed and a little bit.
It's more pleasing appearanceand it still fits right into
their production lines.
Gary Pageau (03:45):
So who do you say are the traditional customers
that you've been working withfor this?
You said like sign shops,things like that, Because I want
to get into later on kind ofthe photographic applications
but who do you see as the mainpeople using UV printing?
Lon Riley (04:00):
technology right now.
Probably the most common, andwhich has been for many years,
is promotional products andcorporate gifting.
Yeah, I tell people that whenpeople ask what do your printers
do, I say that well, they'rebasically kind of like the
inkjet printer you probably havesitting next to you on your
desk, except the head raises upa good bit so you can fit, you
know, any any number of thingsunderneath it phone cases, cups
(04:24):
and tumblers and things likethat.
So promotional products andcorporate gifting are really
probably the staple of theindustry.
You could brand USB speakersand phone cases and things like
that.
Gary Pageau (04:34):
Yeah, I always go with the golf balls.
I said you can put a face on agolf ball.
Lon Riley (04:39):
The golf balls are probably the standard.
Those are the old schoolstandard and they're still
gigantically popular.
We get interest in golf ballsalmost daily.
Gary Pageau (04:49):
So where I've seen the crossover with what I would
call the photographic marketbecause it's all kind of coming
together in kind of this massyou had the photo labs who were
traditionally photographic inthe sense that they were using
photographic chemicals and allthat, and a lot of them added
inkjet, they've added dye, sub,they've a lot of them gotten
(05:10):
into the UV space for exactlythat purpose.
Right, they're working withimages.
Some of their corporatecustomers now want promotional
products.
Are you seeing a lot of thatcrossover as well?
Lon Riley (05:21):
We are, and the great thing about the UV technology
is that it's so versatile thatyou can take one of those high
quality photos and you can putit on products and you can
productize it so you can turn,you convert it to a key chain,
you can convert it to a Tumblr,but you can still also run it
out on very, very high qualityphoto paper or canvas or on a
(05:42):
product such as photo text,which is kind of a really nice
quality peel and stick reusablewallpaper.
So you can do those things.
You can build murals bystitching them, stitching your
photos together into pieces.
It's so flexible.
That's why I think we've seen alot of adoption in that space,
because you can still do thetraditional things that you
(06:03):
normally would, but you can alsoextend the product lines into a
lot of new areas.
Gary Pageau (06:07):
Are there any environmental differences
working with UV materials asopposed to traditional inkjet or
other digital materials, or isit about the same?
Lon Riley (06:16):
I'd say it's relatively similar.
I mean, the inks are low VOC sothey don't have a real heavy
heavy smell to them or anythinglike that.
And it's inkjet technology, soit is a linear inkjet technology
.
We've settled on Epson heads.
We use Epson technology in ourprinters, has been a standard in
(06:37):
so many industries for so longand we just find it makes such
an incredible quality print.
Gary Pageau (06:41):
Sure, sure.
You started on the supply space, but now you're.
You come out with your ownprinters.
When did that revelation comeinto play?
That, oh my gosh, you knowthere's a space in the market?
What was that space in themarket that you saw?
Lon Riley (06:53):
It was the middle of last year and it really started
with some of the tangentialindustries.
For example, I was approachedby a company that's in the
garment space and the premisewas, you know, a lot of the
companies that are in thegarment space really were
relatively unaware of the UV.
So we felt like we had two,really two ways to expand the
market and the UV marketcontinues to grow.
(07:14):
But one was in establishedmarkets that use very similar
processes and very similartechnology and there's an
awareness gap.
They're just unaware that theycan extend their current product
lines with this new technology.
On the other side, we did feellike there was a special place
in the market in that, you know,10 to $45,000 range, where
(07:36):
there were not a lot ofcompanies playing in that area
and you know the options werekind of larger, very heavily
engineered, very expensivemachines or, on the low end,
traditional companies thatoperate with traditional
printing technology.
Gary Pageau (08:10):
You know you mentioned the garment thing
because I that that is also abig of interest to people.
But again you mentioned, youknow, garment printers are kind
of very specific, right.
They're very like.
That's all you can do with themis like a UV printer similar to
yours, an option for somebodywho may not do a lot of garments
and maybe they but they want tothrow in a few shirts.
(08:32):
Is that sort of the idea behindit.
Lon Riley (08:34):
We don't normally do wearable apparel.
The UV, water-based inksperform so much better and they
feel so much better.
We do use UV on fabrics, though, so for things like backpacks
or canvas bags, things like that, so there is a textile hook to
it.
We don't typically recommend itpersonally for wearable
(08:56):
garments, but it is very similar.
The inks are different, but thetechniques are similar.
When I train people on the UVprinting, I normally tell them
it's really a two-step process.
It's getting the object ontothe printer in the right place
and then getting the art ontothe object in the right place,
and it's effectively the samething that the garment folks are
(09:16):
already doing.
The software is very similar,the process is very similar, so
it's a natural fit into thoseenvironments.
Gary Pageau (09:22):
Because the interesting thing is, I always
hear about, you know, garmentsthe next big thing.
And then when you talk to thesoftware people, the people like
who are doing the templates andthe arrangements, they're
saying wait, it's way moredifficult than you think you
know, because it's got to lookright, while it's not flat
wrapped around a person, rightFor printing an entire shirt.
So it's a lot more differentthan, let's say, like you said,
just an image on a backpack orsomething like that.
(09:44):
It's a lot more complex, but wewant it to look good.
Lon Riley (09:48):
There is a lot that goes into it, yes, especially
when you get into the inkchemistries, the color, the
different fabrics and thingslike that.
Yeah, it's a very similarprocess, the inkjet technology
normally.
You see also direct-to-garment,which is a similar inkjet
(10:09):
technology that's been, you know, very popular for some years,
and recently you've seen a lotof, a lot of shift into DTF,
which is the direct filmtransfer technique.
Gary Pageau (10:13):
So you're seeing a lot of that today as well.
So tell us a little bit aboutyour two products, because you
got, you know.
I mean, I've seen pictures.
I haven't actually seen them inperson, but I've seen pictures
of the products.
They're very different, youknow, whereas usually it seems
to me in the printer worldthere's always like the, the got
the, the base model and thenthe slightly faster model, and
then the slightly faster model,with some finishing options on
(10:34):
the backend, but there's reallynot much difference between them
.
But I think your two printersare actually like two very
distinct products.
Lon Riley (10:44):
They are two distinct products.
I mean they operate similarly,they function similarly, we use
the same software.
So we try to make it easy forcustomers that maybe begin with
a smaller printer to thengraduate to the larger printer
without a lot of learning curvefor their operators and teams or
companies that we have thatactually use both.
So we have two models.
The smaller version is theCatalyst Nanos and that's got a
(11:06):
roughly 11 by 17 inch bed singleEpson printhead, and it's a
smaller printer designed for theSMB market.
But we also have seen a lot ofadoption and manufacturing,
rapid prototyping, people thatneed to produce one-off prints
and things like that, conceptpieces.
So we've got it, you know, veryreasonably priced with a lot of
(11:27):
features like bulk ink systemswe're able to bring the ink
costs down for customers andsome built-in safety features as
well Anti-collision bars andthings like that that normally
you don't see in printers thatsize.
We also that one also offers arotary and a roll-based system
so you could print rolls ofwallpaper, you could print a
rotary tumbler, full wrap, andyou can also do DTF with it UV
(11:49):
DTF, so transfer film for, forexample, coffee mugs or
something that you would have ahandle.
You wouldn't normally be ableto rotate all the way around.
And then the bigger system isthe Catalyst Avent ventra that's
got a roughly 24 by 36 inch bed.
So for much larger objects ormuch larger quantities of
objects, that one can printquite a few golf balls at a time
(12:12):
.
It'll really rip them out too.
But you know we did some thingsthat that one's got three heads
in it.
So the typical configurationwill have a white head, a color
head and then a varnish head.
So we can do, um, your whiteunder base normalized colors.
You know varnish techniques,things like that.
Erin Manning (12:29):
Yeah.
Lon Riley (12:31):
And then it's substantially faster with the
three staggered heads.
Gary Pageau (12:36):
So do you think people will be running these
side by side or starting withthe Nano and moving up?
I'm just trying to figure outyou know kind of where you see
these position in the market.
You said you know the Nano ismore of the SMB and the other
one is more of a productiondevice.
Do you think people have bothin some places?
Lon Riley (12:56):
In some places, yes, and it always surprises me.
Like anything else in life, yougo into the conversation with a
customer expecting one thingand then you end up with the
other thing.
So a lot of times too, I'vetalked to Fortune 500 companies
that we were all in on theAventra, and as soon as they saw
the Nanos, they preferred to gothat route.
For, you know, because theywere working on certain, certain
(13:17):
methodologies and conceptswhere that smaller printer,
multiplied in shorter runs, wasbetter for their production
environment than actually onebigger, much faster printer.
It just, it's just.
It happened to suit their needand it was a surprising shift,
but we're happy to accommodateso you know you mentioned
(13:37):
cylindrical thing here earlier.
Gary Pageau (13:39):
Um, at the recent, you know, photo imaging connect
conference we had recently theywere talking about how drink
wearing mugs are probably one ofthe biggest categories still
with all in personalizedproducts, at least in the
photographic space.
That that is like the numberone thing.
And when I was at PrintingUnited last year I saw a lot of
(13:59):
dedicated cylindrically printeddevices.
You know that were just.
They were just rotating waterbottles over and over and over
again.
Why do you think that is?
I mean, I'm just curious.
You know you've been in themarket for a while.
Why do you think drinkware issuch a big product for
personalized imaging?
Lon Riley (14:17):
It seems that everybody's carrying some sort
of drinkware with them, whetherit's water or coffee or
depending on, maybe later in theday, maybe something else.
But you know, somebody seems toalways have a giant cup with
them these days and being ableto add that level of
personalization or somethingthat you know gives them a
little bit of a connection to it, I think just lends a lot to it
(14:37):
.
It's, it's been probably themost popular area for
photographers, but also formonograms crafters.
I mean, it's, it's, it's been a.
I've seen companies that have,like you said, 40 and 50
machines just rotating cups allday long, and the larger
cylindrical machines that arededicated, that's all they do.
(14:58):
You know it's, it's, it'scontinues to be a popular genre,
so of course we accommodate it.
You know the the differencebetween.
You know the bigger cylindricalmachines are normally faster on
a one-up basis, but they'realso very, very, very expensive.
Right, and you know to to thedegree that you could
potentially put in two or threeflatbed machines with a rotary
(15:21):
attachment for the same priceprovides redundancy, and when
you start printing two and threeat a time, all of a sudden on a
per unit basis, you're a littlebit faster.
So we've stuck with the flatbedmodel with the rotary
attachment, and we feel like itjust gives customers the option
that they can do the drinkwareand if the trends shift in the
future years, they can shift tosomething else relatively easily
(15:42):
.
Gary Pageau (15:43):
Yeah, well, that is part of.
The thing is, with a unit likethis, is the flexibility that
you're not committing to onespecific size or dimension of a
printed object or dimension of aof a printed object.
Lon Riley (15:54):
True, I we've with, and with this rotary as well,
we've actually printed.
We've printed a full wrap on amajor league baseball bat barrel
because it's the printer bed iswide enough to accommodate a 33
inch major league bat, so wewere able to put it's a, it's a,
it's a neat little video we didand put out, put a full wrap of
flames on a major league batbarrel, kind of fun.
Gary Pageau (16:14):
So, speaking of like sports entertainment, I you
know, I saw on your websiteyou've done, you've done some
articles on that.
That's really kind of where alot of these items are taking
off, isn't it?
Lon Riley (16:33):
It is.
And sports entertainment youknow we try to treat that as a
niche and it's completely theopposite of that because it's so
gigantic when you look at allthe things that you could
possibly do Right From you know,tournaments, sporting goods,
sporting goods manufacturers,the traditional, as you said,
golf ball customization,baseball customization into
really driving fan engagement,right into really driving fan
(16:54):
engagement.
The great thing about thistechnology is it is you can do
large run or you can do shortrun, but you can basically do it
on demand.
So for a lot of companies thathave, or even teams you know a
lot of the ball teams, minorleague ball teams they plan
their promotions out months inadvance, they order in
quantities but when it comesdown to it, you don't know who's
in the playoffs until maybeTuesday for a Saturday game.
(17:18):
So you know this kind oftechnology allows them to.
You know, all of a sudden I canrip out rally towels and have
them sitting on the seat in thestadium on Saturday once I know
which teams are in, and so youcan have that kind of
flexibility with promotions thatdrive fan engagement.
So we feel like it's a greatopportunity and it's fun.
I mean, we love working withthe sports stuff and there's
(17:39):
really nothing better thansomebody coming in and going man
, I didn't know you could dothat.
So yeah, we'll give it a go andsee what we can do with it in
and going man, I didn't know youcould do that.
Gary Pageau (17:46):
So yeah, we'll give it a go and see what we can do
with it, because I think thiswhole overall personalization
quick, you know, production setof one or design of one, I guess
in a short time is reallywhat's driving a lot of the
market.
You know, seeing a lot of thebigger printers starting to get
more and more involved in thismarket.
Do you think that's atechnology thing or a cultural
thing?
Because think it's.
I think it's a little bit ofboth.
You know there used to be, youknow, when I was growing up, if
(18:07):
I wanted a detroit tigersbaseball because I'm from
michigan, you know it would justbe a.
You know detroit tigersbaseball with maybe a I don't
even know what the technologywas at the time but just
basically the logo on, you know,a d on a ball.
Nowadays you can get that sameball, but it's going to be
personalized with, you know, theday you were at the game and
(18:29):
maybe the score, whatever.
So what do you think is drivingthat?
Lon Riley (18:33):
I mean, I think you're right.
It is that it's both sides ofthat.
And you know selfishly you knowmy name is Lon L-O-N.
When you go to the ballpark andyou see all the baseballs and
they've got Kevin and Mike andJohn there was never a lawn
right, there was always baseball.
That's what I ended up with wasbaseball fan with the logo on
this.
Get the Gary mug there.
(18:56):
So I didn't have that option.
So I can place an order, putbasically anything I want on it
and workflow it.
And to.
The advancements in theworkflow are something that we
work with too, because we workwith a lot of companies that are
doing print-on-demandbusinesses.
So they'll take orders online,they'll be able to workflow them
directly to the printers andthen we can use our software to
(19:17):
almost like a variable data typeproduct.
We can put all those names out,put them in order, match them
to the order codes and then,once the printers run, take them
off and scan them and ship themout to the customer.
So you know the time todelivery has gotten so short.
It's the Amazon effect, youknow.
Sure Nobody wants to wait fivedays.
When they can prime it It'll bethere this afternoon.
Sure, absolutely.
(19:37):
You've seen a lot of that asthis technology continues to
advance and get fast, you've gota lot of that that effect there
.
Gary Pageau (19:44):
I was thinking, though, culturally though,
people want to have themselveson there, where I don't think
that was always the case, right,where you know the, the, the
brand was like what you wantedto aspire to, and now you have
people want to put their owntwist on the brand by adding
their own content to it.
Lon Riley (20:00):
It's content culture.
Yeah, everybody wants to be astar.
Be a star on YouTube or on yourown mug in your car.
It makes it easy.
But, yeah, I think especiallyto it.
Does the short run ability,especially in this creator
culture where people are theirown brands?
I mean, get back to the sportswith NIL.
I mean all the athletes are nowa brand you know so everybody
(20:23):
has the ability to create thatown brand now a brand you know.
So everybody has the ability tocreate that own brand and, with
the technology being accessible, being relatively inexpensive,
you can a B test those things.
You can see what people areinterested in.
You don't have to make ahundred thousand dollar
investment in a theory to findout.
Nobody cares, right.
So it's that's.
That's one of the benefits ofthe short run technology as well
(20:45):
.
Gary Pageau (20:46):
You know it's interesting is that because one
of the markets I cover is thevolume photography market, which
you know schools and thingslike that and then they also do
a lot of sports and dance andcheer and you know those kind of
things, and I've discoveredI've been out of touch,
obviously, from high school fora while, but now high schools
have media days for theirathletes and there's merch for
(21:08):
that.
That is specific for theathletes.
It's amazing and that's whereall this comes into play.
Lon Riley (21:13):
It's amazing.
I mean, you'll see there's,there's agent work now going
down sub high school.
Gary Pageau (21:19):
You know that's a little creepy to me.
Lon Riley (21:22):
It is kind of crazy.
I just had a conversation withthat, with one of the sports
communities that I'm involvedwith.
We were talking about this lastnight and again it's that pro
experience.
You know, as a little kid man,all I wanted to do was nail that
walk-off homer.
You know, for the pros,Obviously, that ship has sailed
and now I make printers.
Gary Pageau (21:39):
I don't know.
There's always time.
Lon Riley (21:41):
There's always time my phone is on.
You know when.
The Yankees may be leaving me amessage right now as we speak,
but chances are I'll be makingprinters again tomorrow.
But I mean, everybody wantedthat experience, you know, and
now you can.
You can get that experience.
You got the media days, theclubhouse, the products with the
kids on it.
You know there's a product thatI saw the other day where they
(22:02):
actually have announcers thatwill you upload a clip and they
will call your kids play.
I mean you know that proexperience that people are
looking for and having yourimage on something like a
baseball card is part of it.
Gary Pageau (22:15):
Yeah, it's well, you know what it's it's.
It's definitely something thatyou know is a great opportunity
for a lot of people.
Do you think there's going tobe a point there where there's
going to be saturation in themarket for this, or is it just
still blue skies for this stuff?
Lon Riley (22:32):
I think there will be and you know it's the next
technology is always around thecorner.
I do think right now we got alot of runway left, though, with
space, because just thediversity of applications that
you know, even the mostrudimentary, boring thing ever
is we print asset tags on modems.
Okay, we, and we do that allday, every day, and there's
(22:54):
nothing fancy about it.
It's asset tag to the most kindof creative stuff.
You could think of the rotarieson bats and you know, sports
gear and things that you want todo or print on demand and
really even event-based, which,as the like most things, as the
technology continues to shrink.
That's another reason we wantedto have a smaller printer.
So, with the Nanos, you know,that's something that we've had
(23:16):
a lot of interest in event-basedPeople that actually bring the
printer to a location and beable to print on demand right
there.
Gary Pageau (23:23):
So to your point.
Yeah, thinking you mentionedlike minor league baseball,
right, I mean, somebody coulddrop one of those things in
their fan shop and, you know,have a personalized baseball
with the, you know lansing lugnuts, for example.
That was the team I was closestto, was, and again, it's that
opportunity.
Whereas you know there are ways, there are ways to do that, you
(23:43):
know, with other technology,but I don't think it had the
quality that I think UV printingdoes.
I think that's the bigdifferential is you're not
sacrificing quality with thiskind of thing.
Lon Riley (23:55):
It's a huge differential.
It really is, because you couldproduce a very, very high
quality photo quality print attwo feet by three feet.
Or you can put a face on a Legominifigure.
You know, we the other day wewere actually testing tiny
images on marbles.
We were printing on marbles fora customer that is getting a
(24:16):
sports promotion, and so it'sfun.
You can get an amazing detailand even the smallest little
pieces.
So the quality is adifferentiator.
And then really the ability tointegrate that workflow software
, so like you're talking about,like a fan shop you know,
driving fan engagement beingable to integrate that
technology with, even perhapslike an app, so as people are
sitting there in the game andthey're interacting with the
(24:37):
game exactly ends and they'reinteracting with the app.
They can order product and pickit up on the way out of the
stadium, right notification, andso there's.
That's why I think there is alot of blue sky with it, in
terms of not just what it can do, but how it can interact and
weave into other technologiesand how people kind of roll it
(24:59):
into other things that they'redoing.
It can become a part of so manyother things.
Gary Pageau (25:04):
Yeah, because part of it is.
You know they're trying tomaximize the potential within
the audience, right?
If you work hard to get someoneto a sporting event, to get
them to a concert, to getsomething to something like that
, you know you've got tomaximize.
These days, you know thateconomic potential, whether you
(25:24):
know so, personalized productsis definitely a way to do it,
especially on site.
I think concerts is a greatidea, for example.
Lon Riley (25:30):
It is Concerts is great, yeah, and then you know
it gives it it also it's.
It's a way to keep thatexperience and keep that brand
in front of the customer whenthey leave as well.
You know we were.
I was talking to a company theother day and we were working on
a promotional item for a, aconcert slash, sporting goods
kind of application, and theysaid, well, durability is not
that important because this isreally kind of a single use item
(25:51):
.
You know and durability isreally not that important.
I said durability is alwaysimportant and that's because you
know.
I mean you don't want them togo home and have the print
peeling off and throw the objectaway.
You want them to take thatobject and put it in their
cabinet and every time they pullit back out of the cabinet they
remember that experience, theyremember the feeling and they
want to come back and do itagain and so it's all right.
Gary Pageau (26:12):
Yeah, I guess durability is kind of Well, yeah
, because I mean that is one ofthe things is you know you got
to go with.
I mean, everyone's had parkfrom 20 years ago and it's just,
you know, just awful.
Like you said, it's fading,it's falling apart and today you
don't have that.
You can have both, actually.
You can have speed and quality.
Lon Riley (26:33):
You can speed, quality, durability, I mean
they're accessible.
And you know, as the printtechnologies improve, so is the
ink chemistry.
So that's one of those thingswe're trying to improve all
three that the speed and qualityof the machines, the chemistry,
and then the software thatweaves it all together so you
get those color, those accuratecolor matches and things like
that bigger companies demand soon the software piece, you know
(26:56):
how well does it fit into likerouting workflow in in
businesses, like, for example,if you had multiple devices
printing different things?
Gary Pageau (27:05):
can you, is it easy to route, or is it a dedicated
thing where you have to downloadthe image into those software
and print it from there?
Is it networkable, I guess ismy question.
Lon Riley (27:14):
We have a workflow software that underlies the core
RIP.
So the RIP software is what weuse, that comes with the printer
and that just allows you totake your art, make the prints,
manipulate the art.
It's very sophisticated RIP,but we also have an underlying
workflow software that doesallow you to pull orders in from
an online presence, integratethem into your workflow and then
distribute that workflow.
So if you had three or fourmachines, you know, for example,
(27:36):
if one machine were downalthough that doesn't happen,
should never happen, or for somereason to happen you could
actually turn it off and rerouteyour jobs to another machine
and then keep the workflowmoving and or dedicate machines
to specific functions.
Okay, so you know, we have somecustomers that run a white
color varnish configuration.
We have some that run adifferent configuration, a
(27:57):
different order, because theymight be doing a reverse print
on acrylic or things like that.
So, based on the product andbased on the layering, you could
route those different parts todifferent printers and have them
get to the right location.
Gary Pageau (28:09):
And that's all bundled into that, the pricing,
the software.
Lon Riley (28:13):
That workflow piece is a different.
That's a different.
Gary Pageau (28:15):
Oh, the workflow piece is different, but the RIP
software comes with it.
Lon Riley (28:18):
It accommodates that the RIP software comes with the
printers and that wouldaccommodate the workflow pieces
in the back.
And we use a system called andwe know we also.
That does include a morerudimentary system.
I say rudimentary but it doesinclude a simpler system that
uses hot folders.
So you know, really anybodywith this core RIP software
could really just port jobs intohot folders on a server or
(28:40):
anywhere else any central datalocation, and the RIP would then
pick those up.
We can do it the moresophisticated way with a really
heavy duty backend workflow, qrintegrated and things like that.
Or you can just generally routetraffic through basic server
folders and get a similarfunction using our software.
Gary Pageau (28:58):
Yeah, because I'm thinking that probably more
suitable for the on-siteapplication, for example.
Lon Riley (29:03):
It would be.
And when it comes to workflowand enterprise workflow there's
you've got to find the rightcustomer in the right place in
the growth curve for that.
Companies that are too smallare not going to want to make
that investment.
The ones that are very largehave already made it and the
switching costs can be high.
Gary Pageau (29:25):
Catching the falling knife.
Lon Riley (29:27):
Right, there you go.
Gary Pageau (29:28):
So where can people go for more information about
DPI Laboratories?
Lon Riley (29:34):
The website is a great start.
It's dpi-labcom and there wehave information on a little bit
of information the workflowsystem software, mostly work
information around the printersand then our inks and coatings.
You can also call us at727-210-5478.
And that's the direct line andyou can get through to our sales
or support team there as well.
Gary Pageau (29:55):
Awesome.
Well, thank you, alan, it'sgreat to talk to you.
I really like talking aboutkind of this, the opportunities
for newer technologies,especially in the photo space,
because it's all kind of comingtogether into one big
opportunity right now.
Lon Riley (30:08):
I love these conversations, Gary.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
Erin Manning (30:11):
Thank you for listening to the Dead Pixel
Society podcast.
Read more great stories andsign up for the newsletter at
wwwthedeadpixelssocietycom.
Welcome to the Dead Pixel Society podcast, the
photo imaging industry's leadingnews source.
Here's your host, Gary Pageau.
The Dead Pixels Society podcastis brought to you by Mediaclip,
Advertek Printing andIndependent Photo Imagers.
Gary Pageau (00:18):
Hello again and welcome to the Dead Pixels
Society podcast.
I'm your host, Gary Pageau, andtoday we're joined by Lon Riley
, who's the founder of DPILaboratory, and he's coming to
us from St Petersburg, Florida,today.
Hey Lon, how are you today?
Lon Riley (00:31):
Hey, Gary, I'm doing.
Great Thanks for having me.
I appreciate it.
Gary Pageau (00:33):
So you're a relatively new company in the UV
printing space.
So for the people who don'tknow what UV printing is, let's
start there and how you got thecompany started.
Lon Riley (00:45):
Sure, UV printing is basically a form of printing
that uses a UV curable ink.
So when the people that arefamiliar with inks that normally
have to air dry or water-basedinks, the difference is when the
UV ink jets on a surface, theUV light immediately goes over,
it cross-links the monomers andit cures immediately.
So once you uh jet onto asubstrate it's immediately ready
(01:06):
to use package send.
So it's a relatively newertechnology.
It's been around for some years.
Uh continued to advance overthe last four or five years,
gained a lot of traction and uh.
You know markets such assignage, uh, promotional
products, of course, award andtrophy uh and photography crowd.
Gary Pageau (01:28):
Yeah, and that's kind of what I want to talk
about a little bit, becauseyou've got some printers coming
out and we'll talk about thatlater.
But you know how long has thecompany been around?
What is the technicalfoundation?
What is your kind of yourunique value that you're
bringing to the market?
Lon Riley (01:39):
We started the company early last year really
based around the uv inks andcoatings.
So we do some specialtycoatings.
They're uv cured for largerprint bar applications,
manufacturing and package typeapplications, do embellishment
and special techniques, glosscoats and things like that.
That's where we started.
After we kind of ran the tradeshow circuit last year, had a
(02:03):
number of former vendors, formerpartners, approach us about
doing a UV line.
We started looking at it andfound some gaps in the industry
and we thought there was a goodplace in the industry for a
really well-built machine that'sat a lower price point than you
typically see but packaged withtop software and then, of
course, with our inks that weformulate here as well.
(02:24):
So a good opportunity to puttogether an all-inclusive
package that would create a lotof value, give customers a lot
of those features that younormally would only see reserved
for much larger, more expensivemachines, but in something
that's more approachable herefor the SMB market.
Gary Pageau (02:40):
So you started really on.
The supply side is the inks anddo you formulate your own?
Is that your own, likeformulations that you've got?
Lon Riley (02:48):
It is we work with a manufacturer, of course.
So we do a lot of work with themanufacturer with specific
things Like we've recentlyreleased a security ink, so it's
a basically like a fluorescentcomponent to a gloss, so you can
jet it on anything and it'srelatively invisible until you
shine a black light on it.
So it's used for things like.
(03:10):
We have a number of customersthat are in the promotional
product space.
They do things like Christmasornaments.
They were using black QR codesto label their products and now
they're able to basically putthat product stamp on invisibly.
But they can still get thebenefit of the automation from
their QR systems, but they don'thave that big old black QR code
(03:31):
hanging out anymore.
Gary Pageau (03:32):
Okay, so it's more pleasing and the appearance is
better.
Lon Riley (03:37):
Agreed and a little bit.
It's more pleasing appearanceand it still fits right into
their production lines.
Gary Pageau (03:45):
So who do you say are the traditional customers
that you've been working withfor this?
You said like sign shops,things like that, Because I want
to get into later on kind ofthe photographic applications
but who do you see as the mainpeople using UV printing?
Lon Riley (04:00):
technology right now.
Probably the most common, andwhich has been for many years,
is promotional products andcorporate gifting.
Yeah, I tell people that whenpeople ask what do your printers
do, I say that well, they'rebasically kind of like the
inkjet printer you probably havesitting next to you on your
desk, except the head raises upa good bit so you can fit, you
know, any any number of thingsunderneath it phone cases, cups
(04:24):
and tumblers and things likethat.
So promotional products andcorporate gifting are really
probably the staple of theindustry.
You could brand USB speakersand phone cases and things like
that.
Gary Pageau (04:34):
Yeah, I always go with the golf balls.
I said you can put a face on agolf ball.
Lon Riley (04:39):
The golf balls are probably the standard.
Those are the old schoolstandard and they're still
gigantically popular.
We get interest in golf ballsalmost daily.
Gary Pageau (04:49):
So where I've seen the crossover with what I would
call the photographic marketbecause it's all kind of coming
together in kind of this massyou had the photo labs who were
traditionally photographic inthe sense that they were using
photographic chemicals and allthat, and a lot of them added
inkjet, they've added dye, sub,they've a lot of them gotten
(05:10):
into the UV space for exactlythat purpose.
Right, they're working withimages.
Some of their corporatecustomers now want promotional
products.
Are you seeing a lot of thatcrossover as well?
Lon Riley (05:21):
We are, and the great thing about the UV technology
is that it's so versatile thatyou can take one of those high
quality photos and you can putit on products and you can
productize it so you can turn,you convert it to a key chain,
you can convert it to a Tumblr,but you can still also run it
out on very, very high qualityphoto paper or canvas or on a
(05:42):
product such as photo text,which is kind of a really nice
quality peel and stick reusablewallpaper.
So you can do those things.
You can build murals bystitching them, stitching your
photos together into pieces.
It's so flexible.
That's why I think we've seen alot of adoption in that space,
because you can still do thetraditional things that you
(06:03):
normally would, but you can alsoextend the product lines into a
lot of new areas.
Gary Pageau (06:07):
Are there any environmental differences
working with UV materials asopposed to traditional inkjet or
other digital materials, or isit about the same?
Lon Riley (06:16):
I'd say it's relatively similar.
I mean, the inks are low VOC sothey don't have a real heavy
heavy smell to them or anythinglike that.
And it's inkjet technology, soit is a linear inkjet technology
.
We've settled on Epson heads.
We use Epson technology in ourprinters, has been a standard in
(06:37):
so many industries for so longand we just find it makes such
an incredible quality print.
Gary Pageau (06:41):
Sure, sure.
You started on the supply space, but now you're.
You come out with your ownprinters.
When did that revelation comeinto play?
That, oh my gosh, you knowthere's a space in the market?
What was that space in themarket that you saw?
Lon Riley (06:53):
It was the middle of last year and it really started
with some of the tangentialindustries.
For example, I was approachedby a company that's in the
garment space and the premisewas, you know, a lot of the
companies that are in thegarment space really were
relatively unaware of the UV.
So we felt like we had two,really two ways to expand the
market and the UV marketcontinues to grow.
(07:14):
But one was in establishedmarkets that use very similar
processes and very similartechnology and there's an
awareness gap.
They're just unaware that theycan extend their current product
lines with this new technology.
On the other side, we did feellike there was a special place
in the market in that, you know,10 to $45,000 range, where
(07:36):
there were not a lot ofcompanies playing in that area
and you know the options werekind of larger, very heavily
engineered, very expensivemachines or, on the low end,
traditional companies thatoperate with traditional
printing technology.
Gary Pageau (08:10):
You know you mentioned the garment thing
because I that that is also abig of interest to people.
But again you mentioned, youknow, garment printers are kind
of very specific, right.
They're very like.
That's all you can do with themis like a UV printer similar to
yours, an option for somebodywho may not do a lot of garments
and maybe they but they want tothrow in a few shirts.
(08:32):
Is that sort of the idea behindit.
Lon Riley (08:34):
We don't normally do wearable apparel.
The UV, water-based inksperform so much better and they
feel so much better.
We do use UV on fabrics, though, so for things like backpacks
or canvas bags, things like that, so there is a textile hook to
it.
We don't typically recommend itpersonally for wearable
(08:56):
garments, but it is very similar.
The inks are different, but thetechniques are similar.
When I train people on the UVprinting, I normally tell them
it's really a two-step process.
It's getting the object ontothe printer in the right place
and then getting the art ontothe object in the right place,
and it's effectively the samething that the garment folks are
(09:16):
already doing.
The software is very similar,the process is very similar, so
it's a natural fit into thoseenvironments.
Gary Pageau (09:22):
Because the interesting thing is, I always
hear about, you know, garmentsthe next big thing.
And then when you talk to thesoftware people, the people like
who are doing the templates andthe arrangements, they're
saying wait, it's way moredifficult than you think you
know, because it's got to lookright, while it's not flat
wrapped around a person, rightFor printing an entire shirt.
So it's a lot more differentthan, let's say, like you said,
just an image on a backpack orsomething like that.
(09:44):
It's a lot more complex, but wewant it to look good.
Lon Riley (09:48):
There is a lot that goes into it, yes, especially
when you get into the inkchemistries, the color, the
different fabrics and thingslike that.
Yeah, it's a very similarprocess, the inkjet technology
normally.
You see also direct-to-garment,which is a similar inkjet
(10:09):
technology that's been, you know, very popular for some years,
and recently you've seen a lotof, a lot of shift into DTF,
which is the direct filmtransfer technique.
Gary Pageau (10:13):
So you're seeing a lot of that today as well.
So tell us a little bit aboutyour two products, because you
got, you know.
I mean, I've seen pictures.
I haven't actually seen them inperson, but I've seen pictures
of the products.
They're very different, youknow, whereas usually it seems
to me in the printer worldthere's always like the, the got
the, the base model and thenthe slightly faster model, and
then the slightly faster model,with some finishing options on
(10:34):
the backend, but there's reallynot much difference between them
.
But I think your two printersare actually like two very
distinct products.
Lon Riley (10:44):
They are two distinct products.
I mean they operate similarly,they function similarly, we use
the same software.
So we try to make it easy forcustomers that maybe begin with
a smaller printer to thengraduate to the larger printer
without a lot of learning curvefor their operators and teams or
companies that we have thatactually use both.
So we have two models.
The smaller version is theCatalyst Nanos and that's got a
(11:06):
roughly 11 by 17 inch bed singleEpson printhead, and it's a
smaller printer designed for theSMB market.
But we also have seen a lot ofadoption and manufacturing,
rapid prototyping, people thatneed to produce one-off prints
and things like that, conceptpieces.
So we've got it, you know, veryreasonably priced with a lot of
(11:27):
features like bulk ink systemswe're able to bring the ink
costs down for customers andsome built-in safety features as
well Anti-collision bars andthings like that that normally
you don't see in printers thatsize.
We also that one also offers arotary and a roll-based system
so you could print rolls ofwallpaper, you could print a
rotary tumbler, full wrap, andyou can also do DTF with it UV
(11:49):
DTF, so transfer film for, forexample, coffee mugs or
something that you would have ahandle.
You wouldn't normally be ableto rotate all the way around.
And then the bigger system isthe Catalyst Avent ventra that's
got a roughly 24 by 36 inch bed.
So for much larger objects ormuch larger quantities of
objects, that one can printquite a few golf balls at a time
(12:12):
.
It'll really rip them out too.
But you know we did some thingsthat that one's got three heads
in it.
So the typical configurationwill have a white head, a color
head and then a varnish head.
So we can do, um, your whiteunder base normalized colors.
You know varnish techniques,things like that.
Erin Manning (12:29):
Yeah.
Lon Riley (12:31):
And then it's substantially faster with the
three staggered heads.
Gary Pageau (12:36):
So do you think people will be running these
side by side or starting withthe Nano and moving up?
I'm just trying to figure outyou know kind of where you see
these position in the market.
You said you know the Nano ismore of the SMB and the other
one is more of a productiondevice.
Do you think people have bothin some places?
Lon Riley (12:56):
In some places, yes, and it always surprises me.
Like anything else in life, yougo into the conversation with a
customer expecting one thingand then you end up with the
other thing.
So a lot of times too, I'vetalked to Fortune 500 companies
that we were all in on theAventra, and as soon as they saw
the Nanos, they preferred to gothat route.
For, you know, because theywere working on certain, certain
(13:17):
methodologies and conceptswhere that smaller printer,
multiplied in shorter runs, wasbetter for their production
environment than actually onebigger, much faster printer.
It just, it's just.
It happened to suit their needand it was a surprising shift,
but we're happy to accommodateso you know you mentioned
(13:37):
cylindrical thing here earlier.
Gary Pageau (13:39):
Um, at the recent, you know, photo imaging connect
conference we had recently theywere talking about how drink
wearing mugs are probably one ofthe biggest categories still
with all in personalizedproducts, at least in the
photographic space.
That that is like the numberone thing.
And when I was at PrintingUnited last year I saw a lot of
(13:59):
dedicated cylindrically printeddevices.
You know that were just.
They were just rotating waterbottles over and over and over
again.
Why do you think that is?
I mean, I'm just curious.
You know you've been in themarket for a while.
Why do you think drinkware issuch a big product for
personalized imaging?
Lon Riley (14:17):
It seems that everybody's carrying some sort
of drinkware with them, whetherit's water or coffee or
depending on, maybe later in theday, maybe something else.
But you know, somebody seems toalways have a giant cup with
them these days and being ableto add that level of
personalization or somethingthat you know gives them a
little bit of a connection to it, I think just lends a lot to it
(14:37):
.
It's, it's been probably themost popular area for
photographers, but also formonograms crafters.
I mean, it's, it's, it's been a.
I've seen companies that have,like you said, 40 and 50
machines just rotating cups allday long, and the larger
cylindrical machines that arededicated, that's all they do.
(14:58):
You know it's, it's, it'scontinues to be a popular genre,
so of course we accommodate it.
You know the the differencebetween.
You know the bigger cylindricalmachines are normally faster on
a one-up basis, but they'realso very, very, very expensive.
Right, and you know to to thedegree that you could
potentially put in two or threeflatbed machines with a rotary
(15:21):
attachment for the same priceprovides redundancy, and when
you start printing two and threeat a time, all of a sudden on a
per unit basis, you're a littlebit faster.
So we've stuck with the flatbedmodel with the rotary
attachment, and we feel like itjust gives customers the option
that they can do the drinkwareand if the trends shift in the
future years, they can shift tosomething else relatively easily
(15:42):
.
Gary Pageau (15:43):
Yeah, well, that is part of.
The thing is, with a unit likethis, is the flexibility that
you're not committing to onespecific size or dimension of a
printed object or dimension of aof a printed object.
Lon Riley (15:54):
True, I we've with, and with this rotary as well,
we've actually printed.
We've printed a full wrap on amajor league baseball bat barrel
because it's the printer bed iswide enough to accommodate a 33
inch major league bat, so wewere able to put it's a, it's a,
it's a neat little video we didand put out, put a full wrap of
flames on a major league batbarrel, kind of fun.
Gary Pageau (16:14):
So, speaking of like sports entertainment, I you
know, I saw on your websiteyou've done, you've done some
articles on that.
That's really kind of where alot of these items are taking
off, isn't it?
Lon Riley (16:33):
It is.
And sports entertainment youknow we try to treat that as a
niche and it's completely theopposite of that because it's so
gigantic when you look at allthe things that you could
possibly do Right From you know,tournaments, sporting goods,
sporting goods manufacturers,the traditional, as you said,
golf ball customization,baseball customization into
really driving fan engagement,right into really driving fan
(16:54):
engagement.
The great thing about thistechnology is it is you can do
large run or you can do shortrun, but you can basically do it
on demand.
So for a lot of companies thathave, or even teams you know a
lot of the ball teams, minorleague ball teams they plan
their promotions out months inadvance, they order in
quantities but when it comesdown to it, you don't know who's
in the playoffs until maybeTuesday for a Saturday game.
(17:18):
So you know this kind oftechnology allows them to.
You know, all of a sudden I canrip out rally towels and have
them sitting on the seat in thestadium on Saturday once I know
which teams are in, and so youcan have that kind of
flexibility with promotions thatdrive fan engagement.
So we feel like it's a greatopportunity and it's fun.
I mean, we love working withthe sports stuff and there's
(17:39):
really nothing better thansomebody coming in and going man
, I didn't know you could dothat.
So yeah, we'll give it a go andsee what we can do with it in
and going man, I didn't know youcould do that.
Gary Pageau (17:46):
So yeah, we'll give it a go and see what we can do
with it, because I think thiswhole overall personalization
quick, you know, production setof one or design of one, I guess
in a short time is reallywhat's driving a lot of the
market.
You know, seeing a lot of thebigger printers starting to get
more and more involved in thismarket.
Do you think that's atechnology thing or a cultural
thing?
Because think it's.
I think it's a little bit ofboth.
You know there used to be, youknow, when I was growing up, if
(18:07):
I wanted a detroit tigersbaseball because I'm from
michigan, you know it would justbe a.
You know detroit tigersbaseball with maybe a I don't
even know what the technologywas at the time but just
basically the logo on, you know,a d on a ball.
Nowadays you can get that sameball, but it's going to be
personalized with, you know, theday you were at the game and
(18:29):
maybe the score, whatever.
So what do you think is drivingthat?
Lon Riley (18:33):
I mean, I think you're right.
It is that it's both sides ofthat.
And you know selfishly you knowmy name is Lon L-O-N.
When you go to the ballpark andyou see all the baseballs and
they've got Kevin and Mike andJohn there was never a lawn
right, there was always baseball.
That's what I ended up with wasbaseball fan with the logo on
this.
Get the Gary mug there.
(18:56):
So I didn't have that option.
So I can place an order, putbasically anything I want on it
and workflow it.
And to.
The advancements in theworkflow are something that we
work with too, because we workwith a lot of companies that are
doing print-on-demandbusinesses.
So they'll take orders online,they'll be able to workflow them
directly to the printers andthen we can use our software to
(19:17):
almost like a variable data typeproduct.
We can put all those names out,put them in order, match them
to the order codes and then,once the printers run, take them
off and scan them and ship themout to the customer.
So you know the time todelivery has gotten so short.
It's the Amazon effect, youknow.
Sure Nobody wants to wait fivedays.
When they can prime it It'll bethere this afternoon.
Sure, absolutely.
(19:37):
You've seen a lot of that asthis technology continues to
advance and get fast, you've gota lot of that that effect there
.
Gary Pageau (19:44):
I was thinking, though, culturally though,
people want to have themselveson there, where I don't think
that was always the case, right,where you know the, the, the
brand was like what you wantedto aspire to, and now you have
people want to put their owntwist on the brand by adding
their own content to it.
Lon Riley (20:00):
It's content culture.
Yeah, everybody wants to be astar.
Be a star on YouTube or on yourown mug in your car.
It makes it easy.
But, yeah, I think especiallyto it.
Does the short run ability,especially in this creator
culture where people are theirown brands?
I mean, get back to the sportswith NIL.
I mean all the athletes are nowa brand you know so everybody
(20:23):
has the ability to create thatown brand now a brand you know.
So everybody has the ability tocreate that own brand and, with
the technology being accessible, being relatively inexpensive,
you can a B test those things.
You can see what people areinterested in.
You don't have to make ahundred thousand dollar
investment in a theory to findout.
Nobody cares, right.
So it's that's.
That's one of the benefits ofthe short run technology as well
(20:45):
.
Gary Pageau (20:46):
You know it's interesting is that because one
of the markets I cover is thevolume photography market, which
you know schools and thingslike that and then they also do
a lot of sports and dance andcheer and you know those kind of
things, and I've discoveredI've been out of touch,
obviously, from high school fora while, but now high schools
have media days for theirathletes and there's merch for
(21:08):
that.
That is specific for theathletes.
It's amazing and that's whereall this comes into play.
Lon Riley (21:13):
It's amazing.
I mean, you'll see there's,there's agent work now going
down sub high school.
Gary Pageau (21:19):
You know that's a little creepy to me.
Lon Riley (21:22):
It is kind of crazy.
I just had a conversation withthat, with one of the sports
communities that I'm involvedwith.
We were talking about this lastnight and again it's that pro
experience.
You know, as a little kid man,all I wanted to do was nail that
walk-off homer.
You know, for the pros,Obviously, that ship has sailed
and now I make printers.
Gary Pageau (21:39):
I don't know.
There's always time.
Lon Riley (21:41):
There's always time my phone is on.
You know when.
The Yankees may be leaving me amessage right now as we speak,
but chances are I'll be makingprinters again tomorrow.
But I mean, everybody wantedthat experience, you know, and
now you can.
You can get that experience.
You got the media days, theclubhouse, the products with the
kids on it.
You know there's a product thatI saw the other day where they
(22:02):
actually have announcers thatwill you upload a clip and they
will call your kids play.
I mean you know that proexperience that people are
looking for and having yourimage on something like a
baseball card is part of it.
Gary Pageau (22:15):
Yeah, it's well, you know what it's it's.
It's definitely something thatyou know is a great opportunity
for a lot of people.
Do you think there's going tobe a point there where there's
going to be saturation in themarket for this, or is it just
still blue skies for this stuff?
Lon Riley (22:32):
I think there will be and you know it's the next
technology is always around thecorner.
I do think right now we got alot of runway left, though, with
space, because just thediversity of applications that
you know, even the mostrudimentary, boring thing ever
is we print asset tags on modems.
Okay, we, and we do that allday, every day, and there's
(22:54):
nothing fancy about it.
It's asset tag to the most kindof creative stuff.
You could think of the rotarieson bats and you know, sports
gear and things that you want todo or print on demand and
really even event-based, which,as the like most things, as the
technology continues to shrink.
That's another reason we wantedto have a smaller printer.
So, with the Nanos, you know,that's something that we've had
(23:16):
a lot of interest in event-basedPeople that actually bring the
printer to a location and beable to print on demand right
there.
Gary Pageau (23:23):
So to your point.
Yeah, thinking you mentionedlike minor league baseball,
right, I mean, somebody coulddrop one of those things in
their fan shop and, you know,have a personalized baseball
with the, you know lansing lugnuts, for example.
That was the team I was closestto, was, and again, it's that
opportunity.
Whereas you know there are ways, there are ways to do that, you
(23:43):
know, with other technology,but I don't think it had the
quality that I think UV printingdoes.
I think that's the bigdifferential is you're not
sacrificing quality with thiskind of thing.
Lon Riley (23:55):
It's a huge differential.
It really is, because you couldproduce a very, very high
quality photo quality print attwo feet by three feet.
Or you can put a face on a Legominifigure.
You know, we the other day wewere actually testing tiny
images on marbles.
We were printing on marbles fora customer that is getting a
(24:16):
sports promotion, and so it'sfun.
You can get an amazing detailand even the smallest little
pieces.
So the quality is adifferentiator.
And then really the ability tointegrate that workflow software
, so like you're talking about,like a fan shop you know,
driving fan engagement beingable to integrate that
technology with, even perhapslike an app, so as people are
sitting there in the game andthey're interacting with the
(24:37):
game exactly ends and they'reinteracting with the app.
They can order product and pickit up on the way out of the
stadium, right notification, andso there's.
That's why I think there is alot of blue sky with it, in
terms of not just what it can do, but how it can interact and
weave into other technologiesand how people kind of roll it
(24:59):
into other things that they'redoing.
It can become a part of so manyother things.
Gary Pageau (25:04):
Yeah, because part of it is.
You know they're trying tomaximize the potential within
the audience, right?
If you work hard to get someoneto a sporting event, to get
them to a concert, to getsomething to something like that
, you know you've got tomaximize.
These days, you know thateconomic potential, whether you
(25:24):
know so, personalized productsis definitely a way to do it,
especially on site.
I think concerts is a greatidea, for example.
Lon Riley (25:30):
It is Concerts is great, yeah, and then you know
it gives it it also it's.
It's a way to keep thatexperience and keep that brand
in front of the customer whenthey leave as well.
You know we were.
I was talking to a company theother day and we were working on
a promotional item for a, aconcert slash, sporting goods
kind of application, and theysaid, well, durability is not
that important because this isreally kind of a single use item
(25:51):
.
You know and durability isreally not that important.
I said durability is alwaysimportant and that's because you
know.
I mean you don't want them togo home and have the print
peeling off and throw the objectaway.
You want them to take thatobject and put it in their
cabinet and every time they pullit back out of the cabinet they
remember that experience, theyremember the feeling and they
want to come back and do itagain and so it's all right.
Gary Pageau (26:12):
Yeah, I guess durability is kind of Well, yeah
, because I mean that is one ofthe things is you know you got
to go with.
I mean, everyone's had parkfrom 20 years ago and it's just,
you know, just awful.
Like you said, it's fading,it's falling apart and today you
don't have that.
You can have both, actually.
You can have speed and quality.
Lon Riley (26:33):
You can speed, quality, durability, I mean
they're accessible.
And you know, as the printtechnologies improve, so is the
ink chemistry.
So that's one of those thingswe're trying to improve all
three that the speed and qualityof the machines, the chemistry,
and then the software thatweaves it all together so you
get those color, those accuratecolor matches and things like
that bigger companies demand soon the software piece, you know
(26:56):
how well does it fit into likerouting workflow in in
businesses, like, for example,if you had multiple devices
printing different things?
Gary Pageau (27:05):
can you, is it easy to route, or is it a dedicated
thing where you have to downloadthe image into those software
and print it from there?
Is it networkable, I guess ismy question.
Lon Riley (27:14):
We have a workflow software that underlies the core
RIP.
So the RIP software is what weuse, that comes with the printer
and that just allows you totake your art, make the prints,
manipulate the art.
It's very sophisticated RIP,but we also have an underlying
workflow software that doesallow you to pull orders in from
an online presence, integratethem into your workflow and then
distribute that workflow.
So if you had three or fourmachines, you know, for example,
(27:36):
if one machine were downalthough that doesn't happen,
should never happen, or for somereason to happen you could
actually turn it off and rerouteyour jobs to another machine
and then keep the workflowmoving and or dedicate machines
to specific functions.
Okay, so you know, we have somecustomers that run a white
color varnish configuration.
We have some that run adifferent configuration, a
(27:57):
different order, because theymight be doing a reverse print
on acrylic or things like that.
So, based on the product andbased on the layering, you could
route those different parts todifferent printers and have them
get to the right location.
Gary Pageau (28:09):
And that's all bundled into that, the pricing,
the software.
Lon Riley (28:13):
That workflow piece is a different.
That's a different.
Gary Pageau (28:15):
Oh, the workflow piece is different, but the RIP
software comes with it.
Lon Riley (28:18):
It accommodates that the RIP software comes with the
printers and that wouldaccommodate the workflow pieces
in the back.
And we use a system called andwe know we also.
That does include a morerudimentary system.
I say rudimentary but it doesinclude a simpler system that
uses hot folders.
So you know, really anybodywith this core RIP software
could really just port jobs intohot folders on a server or
(28:40):
anywhere else any central datalocation, and the RIP would then
pick those up.
We can do it the moresophisticated way with a really
heavy duty backend workflow, qrintegrated and things like that.
Or you can just generally routetraffic through basic server
folders and get a similarfunction using our software.
Gary Pageau (28:58):
Yeah, because I'm thinking that probably more
suitable for the on-siteapplication, for example.
Lon Riley (29:03):
It would be.
And when it comes to workflowand enterprise workflow there's
you've got to find the rightcustomer in the right place in
the growth curve for that.
Companies that are too smallare not going to want to make
that investment.
The ones that are very largehave already made it and the
switching costs can be high.
Gary Pageau (29:25):
Catching the falling knife.
Lon Riley (29:27):
Right, there you go.
Gary Pageau (29:28):
So where can people go for more information about
DPI Laboratories?
Lon Riley (29:34):
The website is a great start.
It's dpi-labcom and there wehave information on a little bit
of information the workflowsystem software, mostly work
information around the printersand then our inks and coatings.
You can also call us at727-210-5478.
And that's the direct line andyou can get through to our sales
or support team there as well.
Gary Pageau (29:55):
Awesome.
Well, thank you, alan, it'sgreat to talk to you.
I really like talking aboutkind of this, the opportunities
for newer technologies,especially in the photo space,
because it's all kind of comingtogether into one big
opportunity right now.
Lon Riley (30:08):
I love these conversations, Gary.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
Erin Manning (30:11):
Thank you for listening to the Dead Pixel
Society podcast.
Read more great stories andsign up for the newsletter at
wwwthedeadpixelssocietycom.
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