Best of the Best: Top Shops Product Spotlight

With just a few days before the tournament's opening face-off and facing cancellation of the project, Bauer Hockey turned to Minneapolis-based Pictura Graphics Inc. to find a solution. Pictura met with representatives from the Xcel Energy Center to propose an alternative, more sustainable solution to adhesive graphics. A dye-sublimated, fabric solution was quickly sewn and brought down to the building and within minutes the project was approved ... much to the satisfaction of Bauer Hockey. The fabric graphics proposed by Pictura Graphics were more sustainable for a number of reasons. First, they were printed on one of the eco-friendly fabrics in their ecoIMAGES line of green graphics. Secondly, the fabric panels were easily set-up and re-used for the girls and boys tournaments, eliminating the need for disposal and re-printing. Finally, Pictura Graphics proposed that after the hockey tournament, the fabric panels be re-finished with grommets so that Bauer Hockey could provide them to the top dealers in the state for unique and recognizable in-store graphics.

"Pictura went far beyond producing high quality graphics for us," said Bauer Hockey product manager Ed Saunders. "They partnered with Bauer Hockey to find a sensible solution for the event while creating an extended opportunity for us to share with our retail partners. Our executive leadership and the local sales reps were absolutely thrilled with the results."

As an encore to the column project, Pictura Graphics was called upon to help their client out of a jam. With less than 24 hours remaining before thousands of hockey consumers spilled onto the trade show floor, Bauer Hockey discovered that the illuminated graphic solution they had selected for the front wall of their exhibit was not going to work properly. Their distress call to Pictura was answered and within hours a 25x25-foot fabric panel was printed, finished, and installed for the Bauer Hockey exhibit. The problem was solved and the client was saved. "They went above and beyond the call of duty," said Saunders.

"There was never any panic, just a focused resolve to get the job done right."

Rank 11
Image King Visual Solutions
New York, NY
www.imagekingvs.com

Click here to view large image of hi-rise graphics.

One of our most challenging project was wrapping a glass building in NYC with One Way Vision material. The image was 80x50 feet and covered rights floors of a 40 storey building in midtown Manhattan. It took 2 weeks to install due to windy conditions. It requires riggers to repel 200 feet down to begin the project with a 45-foot-wide scaffold.

Rank 12
Inkjet International
Dallas, TX
www.inkjetintl.com

Click here to view large image of billboards.

The demands for faster turnaround seem ahead of the fastest printers in the market. We recognized last year more than ever before that bigger the project, faster the turnaround needs to be. We had three larger than usual jobs last year, each of them needing precision both in production and logistics of delivery requests. In June the demand from one client was in excess of 617,000 sqft of print in just over two weeks. In November, a client's need was over 88,000 sqft in a few days. In December, between Christmas and end of the year, another demand was for 130,000 sqft.

Since all three jobs were centered around our core business—billboards—we were able to complete each one of these projects on time without an error.

Rank 14
Mathison Co.
Fargo, ND
www.mathisons.com

Starting Line: Fit for Life! exhibit. Click here to view larger image.

Mathison's is proud of our continued partnership with the Kirby Science Discovery Center at the Washington Pavilion in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. In this exhibit called, "Starting Line: Fit for Life!", Mathison's utilized the leading edge of wide-format technology, including flatbed printing and digital cutting. We also leveraged our experience and capabilities with some tried and true techniques.

Wallpaper and window clings were printed using our Eco-sol technology. We even incorporated cut-vinyl for various shapes and lettering, then applied them to painted backdrops.

All of the graphics had to be durable and kid-friendly—as the Kirby Science Discovery Center encourages hands-on learning. This required us to apply washable laminates to many of the graphics.

Most geometric shapes were printed on photo paper and then mounted between a clear polycarbonate on the front and half-inch black sintra on the back. The cutout human figures on the wall were printed directly to white sintra using the Zund flatbed printer and cut using the Zund precision digital cutter. We used all of our inkjet, solvent, and UV curable machines in this project.

Jeff Kennedy Associates Inc. in Somerville, MA designed the graphics for this exhibit. The end result was a colorful and multi-dimensional exhibit, featuring many of Mathison's wide-format printing, cutting, finishing, and installation capabilities.

Rank 16
Precision Color Digital Imaging
Las Vegas, NV
www.pcolordi.com