Consistency in print quality is vital when printing signs, vehicle graphics, and vinyl wraps. There are numerous occasions when you have to reproduce something you had printed in the past, in part or completely. This may be because a client of yours have added another vehicle that requires the graphics to match the existing fleet or you’re attempting to replace a panel that may have been damaged on a delivery truck.

In whatever the case, it becomes crucial that your colors, media, laminate, dithering type, and even rip software are either the same as previously used or come very close to the original vehicle wrap printing. It’s important to make buying choices carefully when starting out in the vehicle wrap business to avoid constantly changing the quality of your wrap printing.

Make an effort to use a limited range of digital printing media and laminate, so in the future if you have to print something from an archived file – there’s no difficulty identifying what was used in your shop a year ago, three years ago, or longer.

I’ve seen many vehicle wrap shops operate with little organization and when it comes time and they have to repair, replace, or add a vehicle wrap panel, it becomes an all day exercise trying to match something via trial and error.

This becomes even more important when your vehicle wrap shop sends full graphic kits out for installation out of state. The completed vehicle wrap may never be actually seen and a few digital photographs aren’t going to cut it when you’re trying reproduce a vehicle wrap.

In order to avoid going down this road, it’s vital to catalog and save your information. A simple method I’ve found that works is to run a test print at approximately 1/10th scale of your vehicle wrap for each panel. Printing a sample of the wrap at this size gives you a moderate reference in which you can archive. Collect the various scale samples, laminate them, and file them in what ever way works for you.

After a short period you’ll have a small library of previously printed vehicle wraps to reference from, but more importantly you’ll have a visual record of the specs you used for that particular vehicle wrap. You’ll know what kind of media, dithering type, profile, colors, etc. and this will make for an easy effort when you’ll have add to or replace a previous vehicle wrap.