Imprint Process Guide: How Your Logo is Printed

The process of screen printing, or silk screen printing is pretty self-explanatory. Your design is printed on to a screen where ink is then forced through the small holes and onto the surface of your promo item.

Screen printing works best and is the most cost-effective with single-color designs because multi-color designs must be printed in separate layers. This logo printer is one of the most commonly used in the promotional products industry.

Emulsion is a gelatin-like substance used in screen printing. First, the emulsion is spread on the screen and dried. Then, your design is applied to the emulsion by a printer. Finally, the emulsion is exposed to UV light and hardened everywhere besides your design.

Digital printing works much like a printer you would use with a computer. Your digital design is added to the product using a laser or inkjet printer. Color choices are limitless, and detailed designs can be printed with ease using this method.

Digital printing was invented in the 1940s, but the very first Inkjet printers weren’t available to the public until 40 years later.

Pad printing, also known as tampography, is essentially the process of stamping your design onto your promo item. Silicone pads come in different shapes and firmness to accommodate several products. With pad printing, only one-color ink can be stamped at once. However, depending on the item, up to four different colors can be used to stamp your design.

Following World War II, Swiss watchmakers industrialized the pad printing process.

Heat transfer, or thermal printing, uses a special Teflon-coated paper that can withstand high temperatures. The back of the paper is coated with strong adhesives that stick to a product without any wear or tear. Large industrial machines, or heat presses, are used to transfer the design from the paper onto the product.

The first recorded evidence of heat presses came around the 1960s.

The word laser is an acronym standing for “light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation.” Once your logo is programmed into the engraving machine, the laser converts light energy into heat, and directs that onto your item. Lasers can work on nearly any material, however, then cannot engrave color. Use laser engraving in conjunction with other imprint methods.

The process of embossing and debossing is similar to pad printing because it involves a “stamp,” however there are some key differences. First, your logo is molded on to a metal plate and stamped down on to your item using pressure and heat to create an indented logo.

The embossing and debossing processes can be traced back to hot stamping plates and early methods of engraving leather around the 15th century.

Embroidery is the process of creating your logo into a stitched pattern. Your design is uploaded into a computer that tells the machines what to sew. Each thread color is stitched individually, so the options are endless!

Embroidery dates back to handcrafted items from around 3000 BC. The first hand-powered embroidery machine, however, wasn’t developed until the early 1800s.

Like pad printing and embossing and debossing, foil stamp printing uses a “stamp”. Foil stamp prints use heat and pressure with copper or metal plates to create shiny, metallic, or reflective designs. These are often used with invitations, stationery or labels to help logos or branding stand out.

When it comes to precision, there are few printing styles as accurate as offset printing. This method, also known as lithography, utilizes a rubber sheet and ink rollers to press its design onto the paper. You’ll often see offset prints used for magazines, newspapers and even some books.

Offset printing gets its name from the ink rollers, which offset their color onto the rubber stamp that’s used to create the design. It’s been around since the 1700s but is still used to this day for its high quality prints.