Plastisol ink transformed the screen printing industry when it was introduced to the market in the 1970s. Since then, plastisol has become the industry standard. Why is plastisol ink so popular? 

When it comes to altering ink to get it to behave just how you want, ink additives can be invaluable. When you’re trying to get a print to look and feel just so, looking to create an eye-catching effect or printing on tricky substrates, screen printing ink additives are tools you can use to get your screen printing jobs to turn out just right. 

One of the most often overlooked details in screen printing is mesh tension. While brand new screens might print great, over time, your mesh tension will wear down. Poorly tensioned screens can have a major impact on print quality, even if it’s hard to notice that the mesh has become loose or saggy.

To order the right garments for your screen printing shop, you have to understand different fabrics. While our previous blog post provides a primer on general fabric basics, there’s one type of fabric that warrants its own discussion: fleece.

Any screen printer who sets out to find a basic t-shirt to use as a go-to substrate will quickly be faced with the reality of garment selection: there is no such thing as a basic t-shirt.

As a screen printer, you know that customers want their orders filled as quickly as possible with no sacrifice in print quality. Meeting your deadlines is key to keeping your customers happy (and coming back for more business).

“You have to spend money to make money,” but all business owners know that balancing costs is a must when it comes to maximizing profits.

Screen printing with white ink can frustrate even experienced screen printers. The same printing process you use with darker inks on lighter substrates can lead to blurred, fibrillated, heavy-handed or undercured prints when used to print white ink on darker substrates.

For what seems like all of screen printing’s history, screen printers have laid down their art on basic cotton shirts. While basic cotton still might be the industry standard, there are countless shirt options available for screen printing.

If you’ve been thinking about starting your own screen printing business, you’ve likely been wondering just what you need to get your screen printing shop up and running.

Running an efficient screen printing shop starts with reducing your waste. A print shop generates many different kinds of waste, from misprinted shirts to leftover ink and chemicals to cardboard boxes and other containers. And eliminating this waste isn’t always a straightforward process; some screen printing byproducts are potentially hazardous and require special attention. How do you get it all under control?

As the demands of decorating performance wear increasingly cross over into the world of fashion, it’s become necessary to develop new inks for screen printing. Given the strength and extreme stretch of many of these fabrics, it can be difficult to get the desired result, even with special additives. In response to these challenges, a number of ink manufacturers have developed silicone based inks.