Whenever someone laments that there’s nothing new to get excited about in printing these days, I simply hand them a tissue…. with the PaperSpecs Magazine name and cover background on it. And then a tiny gift bag emblazoned with the cover of our premiere issue. That turns those frowns upside down in a hurry!
These items, together with a much larger bag, were all huge hits at our recent PaperSpecs Magazine launch party and are the brainchild of DigiWrap, a start-up that’s come up with a whole new way to get the most out of digital printing. That’s right – they’ve actually developed a proprietary process for digitally printing whatever you want on super-thin tissue paper! In the case of PaperSpecs Magazine, they used a pre-dyed gray paper for the mini-bags and a pre-dyed black one for the large variety. The result, as you can see, is remarkable.
First developed by DigiWrap co-founders Charlie Williams and Brad Boskovic at the latter’s print shop, this short-run tissue paper customization technology got a shot in the arm when it was pitched on Season 8 of “Shark Tank” last December.
While both custom-printed tissue paper and bags are eye-catching, it is the pairing of these that truly make for an unforgettable experience. From the look and feel of the complete package to the crinkling sound of the tissue paper between your fingers, nearly every sense is engaged.
The chief appeal of all this, of course, is customization. In the case of the large bag, DigiWrap printed on a 70 lb. silver metallized sheet that was a very close approximation of the Mohawk Chromolux Digital we used for the cover of our premiere issue. For the mini-bags, they went with a smooth GPA 100 lb. Text matte substrate. Basically any HP Indigo-certified paper can be printed on and then converted into bags ready to be stuffed with your custom-printed tissue sheets.
At the launch party, and the HOW conference the following day, everyone I bumped into immediately zeroed-in on these bags with one thought in mind – this is the perfect giveaway for events without having to invest in huge print runs.
For my part, I had the perfect conversation starter for our new magazine that’s dedicated to – appropriately enough – the power and poignancy of print design!
