The Wider View: We Built This City

The wide-format segment continues to be a formidable center for innovation and inspiration in the broader printing industry. It is where we work and, metaphorically, where we live. It is our city. And one of the things that keeps our city strong is the diversity found within its many homes. There are houses of many sizes — from mansions to small, starter homes. There are houses of many styles — traditional to experimental, purely functional to purposefully innovative. And there is a place for all of them in our city.

Our city was founded by forward-thinking people from other industries — screen printing, photo, reprographics — seeking not just a better way to do what they did, but a way to do something more. Wide-format printing was the hub of the wheel that would take them toward what they sought. It was a fledgling technology at the time — slow to produce, difficult to control, limited in application — but that changed.

The founding principles of wide-format, and its early victories, were enough to warrant technological development. People found new ways of prospering, meshing what was with what could be, innovating, expanding uses for the technology by quickly addressing its limitations. And in so doing, it opened opportunities for new avenues, streets, even expressways. And the city grew. Neighborhoods formed.

I was there. Not building a business, mind you, but working to build the industry. When I came to wide-format in 1991, with the association that became SGIA and is now PRINTING United Alliance, the technology focus was fully-analog: screen printing. It was fascinating to see digital technologies begin to sprout up like weeds in a carefully manicured lawn. Some companies, seeing them as a threat, sought to eradicate them; others, seeing them as a curiosity, allowed them to blossom and grow. Decades later, wide-format digital is the primary technology used for the graphics segment — a garden in bloom.

At this month’s Wide-Format Summit, taking place July 27-29 in Bonita Springs, Florida, presenters, consultants, vendors, and wide-format printing professionals will put this city we’ve built on full display. Over the event’s three days, they will discuss where the segment has been, where it is today, and where it is going next. For the PSPs on hand, they will gain the knowledge needed to help them renovate, improve, even expand.

For those who have either built or bought houses in this still expanding city we call “wide-format,” it’s fantastic that you’ve laid down roots. In a space that continues to see technological improvement and expanding opportunity, there is much to be proud of — let’s call it civic pride!

In the day-to-day, amid the scrapping and hustling of running a business, it may be difficult to appreciate what we, and you, have built. Our foundations are firm, the structures are strong, and the segment — our city — is still vibrant.

Dan Marx, content director for Wide-format Impressions, holds extensive knowledge of the graphic communications industry, resulting from more than three decades working across segments with business owners, equipment and materials developers, and thought leaders.