There are a ton of sign shops and printers out there that can make a custom vinyl or paper banner for you and do an acceptable job, BUT, if your wanting to customize flags, it's a whole different ball game. Just to find a custom flag maker can be a difficult job. There just are very few companies who are willing to make the capital investment required for the specialized digital equipment needed to print on flag type fabric. On top of that, the printers are quite large and in addition, have a bulky oven dryer to cure the ink into the flag material. Because of the oven, which heats up to between 150 and 190 degrees Celsius, there is also extensive venting needed to remove heat and fumes to the outdoors. This is all to say, that, not only are they expensive, they take up a ton of room. It is no wonder, the average sign shop doesn't do custom made flags.
The huge cost of the printer is just the tip of the iceberg. Operating and understanding a digital sublimation ink printer is no simple task, when compared to solvent type printers, used for wide format vinyl banner printing. With solvent ink, basically it can print colors you see on the computer screen. With custom made flags, what you see isn't always what you get on a woven fabric. It takes a great deal of expertise and experience to obtain the correct colors required by the customer for an eye popping custom flag.
Choice of ink for custom flags is a critical component in the process. Just like everything, there are strong vibrant inks with a high level of pigmentation and more inexpensive inks that have weaker colors. Digital printers use four colors to produce a full color output, cyan, magenta, yellow and black or CMYK. Different inks are managed with complex input and output profiles to render the truest color reproduction
Another very important factor a custom flag maker must contend with is the material itself. For digital printing, polyester is the material of choice for custom flag makers. The trick here is picking a weight of fabric that holds up as well as possible to the elements, get a good bleed through of ink to the back side, but is light enough to fly easily in a light breeze. In this case, we use a 120 oz. Material in 150 denier, which is the thickness of the thread. Speaking of thread, most custom flag makers use lighter weight thread that is much easier and faster to sew, but when the breaks that binds the hems around the perimeter of a custom flag, or any flag, the edges fray and tear apart in a hurry.
Finally, proper and professional artwork is a key to a finished customized flag. Our staff of professional graphic artists to make sure your flag end up looking crisp, clean and effective
