The Expanding World of Inkjet Papers

Continuous-feed production inkjet is an exciting, evolving market. Average annual growth since 2010 has been at 93 percent, according to IT Strategies; in 2013 alone, 146 billion pages were printed globally with continuous-feed inkjet. Market-Intell estimates that this represents 350,000 tons of paper in North America in 2013.

Interviews with various paper mills suggest that growth is strong, with several mills reporting growth rates of around 100 percent per year, and one mill reporting growth in excess of 200 percent.

Still, the market for uncoated inkjet treated papers and coated inkjet papers remains less than 5 percent of the total market, and some reports put it below 1 percent. Moreover, while 350,000 tons is a big number, it represents less than 2 percent of the 20 million ton North American paper market. If we take out publication papers and converting grades, inkjet is still only about 5 percent of all pages printed.

Why isn't the market share of inkjet papers larger?

There are technical challenges for paper. This challenge is greater with more color because more color means more ink and more water, and because more color often means coated papers. Coated papers are especially challenging for inkjet because the water must pass through the coating while the colorant remains fixed on the surface.

There are also marketing challenges. Historically, paper and print have largely been sold on price. While quality and service have always been important, it has long been difficult for printers or paper companies to get a premium price based on quality or service. The cost per page is higher for inkjet than for traditional, long-run offset printing, but the value proposition is lower total cost and a better return (ROI) for the print buyer through better targeting, shorter runs and less waste.

The Value Proposition

This value proposition can be a difficult sell in a commodity-oriented environment, but at Canon Solutions America, Marketing Director Kris Albee reports that clients do indeed get a premium price per page.

"Many of our customers have figured out the value proposition; in 2012, 75 percent of all customers bought a second press within 12 months," Albee says.

Domtar's Ann Rieser, director of market development, echoes the importance of the value proposition and explains that "inkjet is a different sell; it requires consultative selling."

Clearly, the high growth rates indicate that continuous-feed inkjet printing is meeting the challenges. Inkjet is finding opportunities in new types of jobs, in replacing offset with shorter runs containing variable data, and in replacing toner-based printing with longer runs at lower cost as data mining improves. IT Strategies estimates that 51 percent of inkjet pages are replacement of toner-based pages, while only 31 percent are replacement of offset. The balance—18 percent—represents new pages. This suggests that the early success has largely derived from converting those who already understand the value proposition for digital printing. However, Marco Boer, IT Strategies vice president, advises that the future growth will likely be in new pages, and that new pages will surpass offset replacement or toner replacement within five years.

Don Burns, Kodak business development director, inkjet technology partnerships, notes that each market segment is at a different level of maturity. In transactional printing, probably the earliest adopter of production inkjet, high-volume customers have moved to lowest cost solutions, typically hybrid printing. He adds that customers are moving to pigment inks, which are inherently waterfast and can often be used on less expensive papers. Customers are also using hybrid printing with inkjet heads on offset presses, often on ordinary offset papers, says Burns.

Offset Papers Popular

Based on interviews with mills and OEMs, Market-Intell believes that as much as 80 percent of all continuous-feed inkjet is printed on ordinary uncoated offset papers. Matte coated inkjet papers have met with success in book publishing, and growth has supported longer runs, which have helped the mills keep costs down. Other markets, such as high-graphic-content direct mail have been slower to adopt continuous-feed inkjet. With higher ink coverage, ink costs rise, and premium inkjet papers are needed.

Mary Schilling, of Schilling Inkjet Consulting, notes that the break point to move to a better sheet is around 15 percent to 20 percent ink coverage, depending on the artwork and image quality required. Beyond that, it is preferred to upgrade to premium treated or coated inkjet papers. She adds that with high ink coverage, a heavier inkjet paper stock may be needed to handle ink saturation to reduce paper cockle and curl. Schilling believes that if continuous-feed inkjet wants a large share of the conventional market, "utilizing an ink with high water percentage as its base carrier just isn't the right way to go. There will have to be a change in ink chemistry."

Albee reports that Canon Solutions America is now seeing more applications with higher ink coverage: more brochures and advertising with as much as 55 percent of the sheet printed with full-color. Media includes glossy and matte coated from Mitsubishi Imaging and Glatfelter, and uncoated from International Paper, Ziegler, Cascades, Domtar, Mondi, Georgia-Pacific and Resolute Forest Products, among others.

According to Albee, Canon Solutions America continues to work with all mills, and "is testing as many papers as possible to build toward the future." She adds that CSA has launched a new Solutions and Media Lab and also created a dye media catalog, which was presented at the 2014 Inkjet Summit. The catalog features samples of various images on a range of papers including 50 stocks from 10 mills. A pigment media catalog will follow.

Early on, Ricoh's focus was on transactional print, mostly with uncoated paper, much of which was untreated. Mike Herold, Ricoh's director of marketing for inkjet technologies, notes that Ricoh has added drying capacity to handle more challenging applications. Ricoh is working with customers to move beyond transactional print into data-rich applications with variable data printing, and can handle coated papers, depending on the level of gloss. Ricoh offers three ink systems: dye, pigment and MICR.

Paper Testing

Kodak has further optimized its technology to print on many standard offset papers, especially for trade books. Burns adds that Kodak has been working with mills for more than 20 years and has tested 4,500 papers. The Kodak Prosper Paper Rating program now has over 250 papers rated, and about 25 percent are standard offset grades and are suitable for monochrome applications. With full-color printing, paper technology matters greatly and Burns says that "for inkjet, no two papers will print exactly the same. Paper science is just that, and some