Wine Glass Printing

Since personalization has been all the craze, wine glass printing has transformed from just text and small logos to full-color graphics with digital printing. Digital printing machines make it easier than ever to change your artwork whenever you desire. Change graphics for every product or keep the same artwork for large production runs. For example, if you are printing wine glasses as a wedding gift for guests, you can use the same basic design for each one but change the name on each cup to match the name of the guest. This one-off printing technique could be a great substitution for place cards at a table. Yet, if you want to make themed wine glasses, such as for the winter holidays, you could print 1000 glasses that say, “Merry Christmas,” and another 1000 that say, “Happy Hanukkah.” Whatever the occasion, people love wine, and appreciate personalization even more. As an added bonus, digital printing brings flexibility to your production line. If you are printing wine glasses now but switch to a new glass in the future, you can easily print on your new substrate. 

What kind of digital printer do I need?

The type of digital printer to consider will depend on speed, desired quality and price point. 

Speed

Typically, machine vendors will identify their average speeds in parts per hour (pph). Although identified, it is important to note that these speeds will differ amongst different artwork sizes. Luckily for wine glass printing, this speed will only vary slightly from part to part because the average part height is about the same.

Quality

If you require photographic quality imaging, it is important to work with the company’s application team to produce samples. Although a digital machine has the capability to print photographic quality, testing the machine’s output should be a step taken before purchase. Some machines work best for personalizing names while others will work best for printing photographs.

Price

With any machine, the price will be a huge deciding factor for purchasing or not. Aside from the machine itself, looking into what the company you are purchasing from has to offer is just as important. Everything from service locations to technicians to warehouse locations should be identified.

What should I know?

Pre-Treatment

When wine glass printing, pre-treatment will be needed in order to ensure ultimate adhesion. Depending on your adhesion requirements, your pre-treatment methods could change.

Learn more about UV digital printing on glass

Extreme curvatures

A full-wrap print can only be accomplished on the top section of the stemmed wine glass. Once the glass starts becoming narrower and ultimately creating the stem, digital printing becomes impractical.

Differing sizes

If you have a variety of wine glasses you are printing on, different tooling fixtures will be needed. Tooling or fixture, firmly holds your product as the digital printer is decorating it.

If your business prints on wine glasses, or you are looking to add customized drinkware to your product line, it is important to know which features to look for and the challenges wine glasses pose, in order to choose the right digital printing machine for your application. If you need further assistance choosing the optimal digital printing machine, contact the experts at Inkcups. We are the only true turn-key supplier of digital printing supplies including machines, inks, fixtures, technical support, and more.