Written by Bill Michael
eMarketing Manager, Xerox Corporation
MAR Graphics was approached with a particularly complex job— to more efficiently produce and streamline fulfillment for one government agency’s permit program. For this program, any truck that hauls a certain type of material needs a certificate and a sticker on the truck and trailer. Not only did the stickers need to be color coded by year, but they also needed to remain colorfast throughout their year of issue, stay affixed no matter what weather conditions the hauler encountered and incorporate authentication and anti-forgery features.
Combining Capabilities to Expand Business.
MAR Graphics was tasked with the challenge of not only providing this solution – but finding a way to deliver it at a lesser cost than what the agency had been previously paying.
“What we were trying to do is take a document that was extremely expensive to produce and didn’t incorporate security features and produce it cost-effectively with security built in,” according to Brian Coats, Director of Marketing for MAR Graphics.
The state’s previous vendor had been printing the stickers on an 8.5” x 11” vinyl sheet using a different process. This provided print-on-demand flexibility, but was expensive, cumbersome and lacked a high level of security.
MAR Graphics offered a new solution, with a shell that was preprinted, pre-perforated and stickers already affixed – meaning everything was ready to go once MAR Graphics received the data from the state each week. Xerox® FreeFlow® VIPP® solution was used to streamline personalization and the 8.5” x 11” preprinted sheets were run through a Xerox Nuvera® to produce an all-in-one document, containing a pre-perforated registration card and two stickers that went directly onto the vehicle.
Secure from the Elements – and Fraud.
The registration document featured key data, including mailing address, registration number and expiration date. A number of security features detered alteration and forgery, such as:
- Thermo Ink that disappears once rubbed and reappears once it cools
- Microprint in the color background
- A unique certificate border
- Hidden features right in the sheet
The two stickers each had a clear fluorescent varnish applied. To verify a truck or trailer’s authenticity, officials could hold a UV light source to the sticker and the clear varnish would glow. The preprinted inks on the stickers were colorfast and lightfast—fading only 2 percent after hundreds of hours of UV exposure over the course of a year. This was essential as the stickers must be able to perform in environments fluctuating from minus 40 degrees to over 200 degrees Fahrenheit.
A New State of Efficiency.
By creating this all-in-one document, MAR Graphics helped save the government agency 30%–40% in print and fulfillment costs. They are able to quickly turn around the printing and fulfillment of the stickers and cost-effectively produce small to medium runs while quality checking each piece to ensure accuracy. Most importantly of all, the agency was thrilled with the quality, performance and cost that this outside-the-box solution offered by MAR Graphics provided.
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interesting post , thx for this.