PALO ALTO, Calif., – New HP Indigo user Jakprints needed a printing solution for short-run work that supported its enduring commitment to sustainability while meeting its clients' demands for true offset quality.

The Cleveland-based print service provider, which specializes in direct-mail campaigns, stickers, apparel and other promotional items for musicians, artists, designers and businesses, installed an HP Indigo 7500 Digital Press to achieve its goals.

"By installing HP's flagship sheetfed press, Jakprints gains the combination of productivity enhancements, offset-quality imaging and very low waste that can take Jakprints' business to the next level," said Jan Riecher, vice president and general manager, Graphics Solutions Business – Americas, HP.

Short-run printing with a long-term, sustainable perspective

The company is seeing momentum behind its short-run work. A favicards.com web-to-print business card offering, for instance, will be featured in an exhibit at this month's HOW Design Conference. Unlike its analog offset presses, however, the HP Indigo 7500 allows the company to produce shorter-run quantities without disproportionate amounts of waste.

"We are excited to offer our customers true lithographic quality printing on virtually any substrate, and the lower environmental impact the press offers is just as important as the quality," said Nick DeTomaso, Jakprints' chief operating officer. "We never make a business decision without putting a ton of consideration into its environmental impact. We like how the HP Indigo 7500 removes nearly all the makeready waste in production for more-efficient short-run printing."

Meeting demanding clients' high-quality needs

Many of the artists and graphic design professionals working for Jakprints' music clients have high expectations in terms of color quality and accuracy. After researching digital printing solutions available on the market, Jakprints' executives found that HP Indigo's unique ability to print in up to seven colors – using liquid HP ElectroInks instead of dry toner – made it the only digital press technology that could successfully and consistently meet these clients' need.

"We consider our customer base to be the most creative in the industry," said DeTomaso, "so the HP Indigo 7500's ability to run CMYK inks plus Pantone-licensed spot colors and white ink is exciting for us and it really unlocks the artistic potential of our customer base."

Company clients who have t-shirts printed on colored fabrics using Jakprints' screen printers can now have matching full-color collateral printed on colored papers using the HP Indigo 7500 and its white-ink capabilities. The press also gives Jakprints the ability to print with extended ink sets for more vivid or photographic quality images.

"Adding light cyan and light magenta inks, or orange and violet inks, to the CMYK ink set allows us to really expand the color gamut of our printing," said DeTomaso. "It provides the best color we have ever seen from a piece of print technology."

High quality, high value and greater sustainability

The HP Indigo 7500 is HP's flagship sheetfed press, offering true offset- and photo-quality imaging up at speeds up to 120 four-color, letter-size pages per minute. It is ideally suited to handle short- to medium-run length jobs as well as high-value applications, such as variable-data-driven marketing collateral, photo books and personalized direct mail.

The press offers Intelligent Automation features for improved productivity, automated calibration and troubleshooting with a Vision System solution and improved color consistency.(1) The HP Indigo 7500 also uses less imaging oil and consumes up to 10 percent less energy per printed page.(1)

In addition, the press prints on a wide variety of HP Indigo-certified, environmentally credentialed third-party media. With more than 850 certified substrates that have at least one environmental credential, customers can choose from a wide range of media with an attractive environmental profile, including substrates that are Forest Stewardship Council-, Sustainable Forestry Initiative- and Elemental Chlorine Free-certified, as well as carbon neutral and recycled media.

More information about HP Indigo digital presses is available at www.hp.com/go/gsb or through the HP Graphic Arts Twitter feed, www.twitter.com/hpgraphicarts.