The largest meeting of professionals from the field of advertising and printing services, marketing, media and packaging in Central Europe took place from 29 to 31 May 2018 at the PVA EXPO PRAGUE Exhibition Centre in Letňany. This year’s edition was very rich again, and popular competitions, exhibition events, lectures or workshops organised directly at the expositions of individual exhibitors were not missing either.
This year the trade fair celebrated its 25th anniversary and prepared attractive expositions for visitors with a lot of innovations. The visitors whose number was 8,852 this year found their favourites there without any doubt - the trade fair event offered presentations of 228 firms from 10 countries on a gross exhibition area of 12,480 square metres.
Innovations of digital printing and refinement were presented at the trade fair
In the Hall no. 4, DATALINE TECHNOLOGY, a.s. presented the unique printing machine “HP Indigo 12000” for the first time in the Czech Republic (there are five of these machines in the Czech Republic and Slovakia at present). Presentations with demonstrations of digital print and the use of this machine for advertising agencies and designers took place at the exhibition at the stand of the firm for the entire term of the trade fair.
Bitcon presented to the trade fair visitors a representative of the new Versa UV – S Series, a unique belt printer with a sliding belt for a universal solution of the UV printing process, which offers a possibility of printing on objects as high as 200 mm with a weight of 100kg/m2. The visitors could find also an offer of UV technologies of the Roland brand at the stand, with an entire range of UV printers, from desktop printers of the LEF series for printing on advertising objects or industrial parts and prototypes to a hybrid printer for printing on roll as well as board materials of the LEJ-640 type.
A trendy matter in the field of digital printing is to offer an added value not only in the form of high-quality prints, but also in the area of subsequent finishing and refinement. Konica Minolta presented its offer at the trade fair just by means of various demonstrations of applications of digital 3D refinement of printed matters by using the MGI JetVarnish technology, through applications of UV varnish and metallic foils. Besides a better visual impression, this technology adds also a touch dimension to printing applications.
It was possible to see unprecedented possibilities of digital printing and unbelievable, inspiring applications by using the Océ elevated printing technology at the exposition of Canon. The trade fair visitors were the first people in the Czech Republic that got familiar with the large-format roll-to-roll printer OCÉ COLOREDO 1640 with a width of 64 inches, which uses the new UV gel printing technology. The Canon UV gel ink is typical of its immediate “adhesion” to the surface.
XEROX presented news as well. One of its innovations was the breakthrough digital high-end printing technology which was there even for the first time in Europe. Besides the actual technology, the visitors could see also its further possibilities useable in the field of refinement or finishing processes. This included also demonstrations of production of digitally printed packages, including finishing with the help of hot sleeking and die cutting by using the KAMA machine.
Presentations of other exhibitors were attractive too…
New trends were brought by some exhibitors directly from FESPA and were presented by them to visitors in Prague at the Letňany Exhibition Centre. Such companies as RICOH, Spandex or Slovakia-based Nanotec welcomed their customers with large expositions.
In the polygraph section, visitors could see expositions of such firms as Canon, HSW Signall, Comimpex, Papyrus, Bitcon, Tepede, Profisign, Electron, COMAC, OKI and other well-known companies. Some firms changed, in comparison to previous years, their places as well as exposition areas which were often markedly larger.
One of the largest expositions was presented by Spandex, whose exhibition area of 320 m2 reached across the entire width of the Hall no. 4. Spandex represents world brands and offers a wide range of materials for signmaking and digital printing. The company has been very successful in the textile segment already for the second year, which means that every year it extends its offer of textile materials, and this year the trade fair visitors could see, with their own eyes, really interesting materials and applications. A special bonus was an arranger with printed samples and a lecture specially focused on textile materials and applications held every day. The company also extends its own brand ImagePerfect™ and this year it would like to focus more on the board materials. The large offer of this company includes foils of virtually all types, whether the matter concerns cast, rolled or special foils.
A part of the stand of the 3M Company was the original delivery with 3M products and demonstrative presentations of applications from a certified application engineer.
Ricoh having its stand at the beginning of the Hall no. 4 prepared various news in the form of a technology used for direct printing on textile products known as DTG, communication and imaging technologies, including cloud solutions, and presented innovations and available improvements for production printing machines in its range. A new printing technology marked as Pro C7200SX was presented in the production segment at the stand. In the DTG – direct to garment - segment, Ricoh presented technologies with direct printing on textile products, Ri 3000 and Ri 6000 printing equipment.
The 4ISP company prepared a special innovation for the trade fair - it is applied to fabrics and consists of the Relicut marking laser, which is able to cut the textile before sewing to the right cutting format in a few seconds and then recurrently according to the drawing entered in the machine. In addition to the cutting of fabrics and marking of images and ornaments it is possible to use the new type of the laser also for other decoration purposes. For example, some firms use the marking CO2 laser for creation of an effect of washed-out and ironed jeans. The CO2 laser is able to create the same effect in a few tens of seconds, cleanly and in an environment-friendly manner without using any additives or chemicals and absolutely without any waste.
A view of the world of advertising
The world of advertising is naturally associated with the REKLAMA POLYGRAF Trade Fair. Besides the advertising textiles and stationery, it is also USB units or flash disks that are popular useful advertising objects. A specialist in IT gifts of all types is ZPROGOteam. Advertising, promotional as well as festive types of high-quality chocolates were not missing at the stand of the well-known supplier, the company “Čokoládovny Fikar, s.r.o.”.
The firms offering advertising textile products organised their presentations in a grand style this year, of which the trade fair visitors could make sure at expositions of such firms as Adler, T-SHIRTS 4U, Sportica, Cotton Classics, Taurus Textil, Alex Fox, Kapatex, Alpitrex and others. The Austria-based company Falk&Ross presented several collections of various brands, of which e.g. the SG brand offered a hot innovation - printable canvas shoes SG Footprints. It does not matter whether you decide for digital printing, transfer printing or embroidery – SG Footprints are created by your fantasy, and therefore they are unique. It was possible to see advertising textile exhibits of a premium quality also at the stand of Silic Média, where visitors could choose from a wide range of products – from classical clothing to work clothes, overalls, business textile and functional sports clothing.
Embroidery machines were traditionally presented at the trade fair by expositions of such firms as Nedbal Trading, Šicí technika Brother, Tama Bohemia or Stick. Visitors could find laser etching, cutting or CNC machines for example at such stands as Uhal Trade, 4isp, HaWe systems or Pilart.
Also this year it was possible to see at the trade fair interesting presentations of companies representing the nomenclature of advertising and gift objects, such as Brand Gifts, Náramky 24, Chocolissimo, Grapp, Repre and companies from the digital signage sector (Rex).
Interconnection of the REKLAMA POLYGRAF and OBALY (PACKAGING) Trade Fairs
Besides manufacturers of packaging systems, the exhibition area offered also various presentations of suppliers of materials, including such companies as Antalis or Papyrus.
The OTK Group is one of the largest manufacturers of labels on our market. In addition to various types of labels, the trade fair visitors could see also special or flexible packages, including Smart Pack.
The attractiveness of packages connected with the use of paper and cardboard materials with surface finishing using special foils (silver, gold, holograph) was demonstrated at the trade fair by Achilles CZ s.r.o. Specialities of the printing art were presented by Ottova tiskárna, which has been building upon quality of polygraph and printing staff for a long time. Apart from the wide range of printing applications, the company manufactures also tailor-made gift bags, which were made according to customer wishes at the company’s stand in the view of visitors on a tailor-made basis.
The professional partner of the OBALY (PACKAGING) Trade Fair was the Czech Packaging Institute SYBA this year as well, which was also the sponsor of a number of accompanying events and programmes. The established prestigious certified nation-wide competition known as “Package of the Year” was newly presented as a simultaneous event with the trade fair.
Car wrapping is coming back
At this year’s trade fair it was again possible to see car wrapping, which is still popular and demanded. All-day presentations of a professional car wrapper were prepared for those who like this technology, with possibilities of individual consultations, and those interested could even enjoy their own testing of materials.
Accompanying programme of the trade fair
An all-day-long specialised accompanying programme took place for all the time of the trade fair at individual expositions of large exhibitors. A professional discussion meeting entitled “One Hundred Years of Advertising (1918-2018)” was prepared for pre-registered participants on the second day of the trade fair. Like every year, the results of the competitions “Calendar 2018” and “Rainbow Beam 2017” were announced within the framework of the trade fair. Altogether 91 registered works were evaluated in the Calendar 2018 competition. The winner in the desk calendar category was “Typographicus 2018” which was registered by Formall CWS s.r.o. The prize of the public was awarded to the calendar entitled “I Love Prague 2018” registered by the company “Miluju Prahu, s r.o.”. The GRAND PRIX award was won by the National Theatre Ballet for the calendar entitled “National Theatre Ballet 2018”. The Expert Jury assessed this calendar as the best one of all registered calendars, thanks to the collection of black-and-white authentic photographs illustrating the background of the artistic world, because of its simplicity, high quality of the black-and-white photographs and polygraph processing.
Altogether 57 works were registered in the 15th edition of the competition for the best signmaking realisation of 2017 for the Czech and Slovak markets, known as the Rainbow Beam. The ceremonial handover of all prizes took place on the second day of the trade fair.
The already 6th edition of the trade fair for event services known as Event Day was held simultaneously on 30 May 2018 in the Hall no. 2 with participation of 59 exhibiting firms this year.