In retail garden centers, it seems the need for an informational picture label accompanying the plant is as important as the quality or size of the plant itself. I have been told by some of our garden center customers that plants with quality picturelabels will outsell plants without picture labels. Retail consumers can be easily swayed to choose the plant with the pretty picture label over plants with no labels or labels that contain only text. In recent years it has become the responsibility of the grower to develop these labels and have them manufactured and printed by companies that specialize in this process, and then purchase and warehouse the labels that will be needed for the upcoming sales season. When all goes according to plan, then thesystem works satisfactorily, as long as someone with great attention to detail manages the process. However, minimum order quantities of labels, changes in production, liner substitutions, and changes in consumer trends, often create a surplus of outdated labels. Labels that were paid for, but will never be used, is not a profitable thought.To better serve our garden center customers, we knew we needed to supply them with color picture labels, but we wanted to find a way to do this without inventoryingthousands and thousands of preprinted labels. Our goal was to develop a system to print color picture labels by order at time of order collection. We felt the benefits of such a system would be to eliminate the need for a warehouse full of preprinted labels and someone to run it, eliminate the accumulation of outdated labels, and be able to purchase only blank label stock. With the technological advancements of thermal printers and computer software, we have been able to develop such a system.
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