This article appeared in the March 2025 issue of Australian Printer, authored by Global Signs’ Joseph Lagana
2024 was a steady year for Global Signs. However, from an overarching industry perspective, the economy was in a bit of a ‘limbo’ coming off the back of the interest rate rises in 2023. The effect of that clearly put a bit of a downer on everything and marketing budgets were the first thing to get slashed.
Dealing with this was a challenge for most in the industry as many businesses these days depend on event activations for jobs, and we saw some of the large corporations either significantly reduce budgets for campaigns or cancel them altogether.
I expect 2025 to be similar – the year will continue to be challenging, and the industry needs to focus on innovation and constantly adding value to our clients and surpassing their expectations to stay relevant.
In saying that, I believe our biggest challenge is also our biggest opportunity. Time and time again, we have had to deal with challenges such as pricing issues and certain players driving prices down while the costs of business escalate.
We know from experience that in the long-term, this strategy is not sustainable. We have seen the effects of this – the price driven companies are not able to sustain themselves and eventually, close their doors.
As an industry, we need to ensure we maintain a level of integrity and value our work. In turn, our clients will see more value than just dollars and cents.
As for Global Signs, streamlining some of our production processes has been on the top of our list for a while, so we will be concentrating on that this year.
In our industry, there is so much involved from the initial sales consultation process to finally installing a sign or print.
Therefore, we need to always be looking at ways to quicken the process in between to provide our customers with not only quality products, but also speed to market. This will be the primary focus for Global Signs for the rest of the year.
Adding value is also very important to us as a business. Sometimes clients will only focus on the price of the print, and it’s our responsibility to remind them that it’s also about the service.
In 2024, to improve on our services to market, we promoted our sustainability offerings to ensure our clients were well educated on the process of print and the ways where we can help them reduce their carbon footprint.
This year, we aim to take this one step further by pushing out PVC-free roll media. About 60 per cent of our rigid printing is on environmentally friendly stock, so getting our roll substrates up to the same mark would be a dream. Our clients love it, but it’s just a matter of bridging the gap on price as compared to what they have been used to paying.
With larger corporations pushing hard for greener materials, I expect suppliers to increase their offerings of sustainable materials as well.
As speed to market and sustainability will lead priorities in 2025, I foresee faster machines with green credentials to be debuted at this year’s tradeshows. Printers are getting faster, more environmentally friendly, and more cost effective – this is very welcomed by the industry.
I have been in this space for 20 years and the evolution of wide format has been phenomenal. I always look forward to seeing what suppliers have on offer at tradeshows. We usually use it as our base for purchasing – for example, at the last PacPrint, we ordered a full wide format kit, swapped out all our eco solvents for latex, and brought in a new cutter.
My final message to the industry is this – keep striving for excellence. We made it through COVID, so the challenges we face now are simpler, in comparison.
People in print are so unique. I tell everyone how dedicated people in our industry are. We are smart, creative, and resilient. If we value our work and the people around us, our businesses and staff will prosper. Moving forward, training staff to be skilled in more than one job will be paramount to business, especially considering the lack of skilled people in print. Education in any form is a great tool, but in our fast-evolving industry, this is vital to both the business and the employee.
Comment below to have your say on this story.
If you have a news story or tip-off, get in touch at editorial@sprinter.com.au.
Sign up to the Sprinter newsletter
