Where finished jobs were getting stuck
Most of the Cape Town sign shops, studios and marketing teams we supply now print clean colour in-house on a 44 inch poster printer or a window graphic printer. The trouble starts once the print leaves the roll. Somebody has to cut the stickers out. The shopfront poster needs protecting from scuffs, and too often the job goes out to another supplier for finishing.
Our Montague Gardens sign shop project showed it clearly. A higher-capacity printer sorted out colour and speed almost at once, but everything after the print stayed slow: stickers trimmed by hand with a craft knife and posters sent away for lamination.
“Once the printing is sorted, the time goes into finishing. Customers would print forty decals in twenty minutes and then lose the afternoon cutting them out. That is the part we wanted to help with.”
Oarabile Xaba, Wide-Format Specialist
We gave the bench three jobs:
- Contour cutting for printed stickers, decals and labels, so every shape comes out clean and matches the last one.
- Lamination for posters, presentation boards and window graphics that need to survive handling, sun and cleaning.
- A compact layout that fits an ordinary workroom rather than a factory floor.
The kit AM.CO.ZA supplied
We spoke to a few suppliers about finishing equipment. AM.CO.ZA opened by asking what our customers print and which widths come off our wide-format machines, and only then put forward machines to match.
- Contour-cutting vinyl cutter. The AM.CO.ZA Vinyl4 Studio 1350 mm contour cutter, from the contour vinyl cutter range, uses semi-automatic contour cutting to follow the outline of each printed design. Once the sheet is lined up on its marks, it cuts around every shape on its own, and the collection basket underneath keeps long runs off the floor. Shops that mostly cut plain sign vinyl will find more options in the wider AM.CO.ZA vinyl cutter range.
- Wide-format laminator. The AM.CO.ZA Rollman 1520 mm hot and cold laminator, from the laminator range, lays a clear protective film over posters and graphics wider than anything our 44 inch printers produce. Cold lamination suits most inkjet work and window graphics, and the pneumatic roller lift makes it easier to mount prints onto Perspex or Corex for presentation pieces.
How a job moves along the bench
Pieter Smit, our Service Technician, laid the bench out in the order a job travels: printer, cutter, laminator and then a long worktable for trimming, weeding and packing. Nothing needs to be carried back across the room.
A typical sign-shop order now runs in four steps:
- Print on the wide-format printer, with print-and-cut marks added to the design file.
- Cut the printed sheet on the contour cutter: once it is lined up on the marks, it traces every shape to the same line.
- Laminate posters and window panels on the Rollman so they last in a shop window or a busy passage.
- Trim and pack at the worktable, using the media and finish picked for the job on our media matching checklist.
The bench also sharpens our advice. When a customer is torn between gloss and matte, or unsure whether a window graphic needs lamination at all, we run a sample and hand it over. Our notes on choosing a poster finish and handling poster rolls cover the same choices in more depth.
Teams the bench was built for
- Sign shops printing decals, labels and window graphics that want cutting and lamination under their own roof.
- Marketing departments turning out event posters and point-of-sale graphics that get handled all day.
- Design studios mounting presentation boards and sample packs for client meetings.
Still choosing the printer itself? Begin with our first wide-format guide. Finishing pays off most once the printer is already busy.
Why we chose AM.CO.ZA for finishing
Service. The AM.CO.ZA team arrived with questions rather than a catalogue. They matched machine widths to our printers, worked with Pieter on setup and registration-mark calibration, and took our team through a proper handover before the bench was shown to any customer.
Price for the build quality. This equipment runs every working day in a showroom. The cutter and laminator are solid, easy to operate and sized for small production teams, and we did not pay for capacity our customers will never use.
Support close by. The AM.CO.ZA Cape Town branch is near Ndabeni for blades, laminating film and advice. Customers who want their own finishing corner can read the reviews and how-to pages in the AM.CO.ZA guide.
“Our customers want one place that understands the whole job, from colour to the finished piece on the wall. Printers and inks are what we do best, and working with AM.CO.ZA on finishing means we can give a straight answer on the rest.”
Danie Vosloo, Managing Director
Visit the bench in Ndabeni
The finishing bench lives at our Ndabeni base, and our wide-format setup team can show where finishing fits in your own print room. Use the contact form to book a visit, or ask Zanele Mkhize or anyone else on our team.
Key facts
| Location | Ndabeni base, Cape Town |
|---|---|
| Built for | Sign shops, marketing departments and design studios |
| Contour cutting | AM.CO.ZA Vinyl4 Studio 1350 mm (V4-S1350) |
| Lamination | AM.CO.ZA Rollman 1520 mm hot and cold (RM-1520) |
| Job flow | Print, contour cut, laminate, trim and pack |
| Equipment support | AM.CO.ZA Cape Town branch |
