This is the third post of our pre-show Ink Kitchen advice on folks to check out at Long Beach ISS show Friday, Saturday and Sunday this week. Come by The Ink Kitchen “Know-It-All” booth #157 which will be located on the far left side of the show floor. We have some cool stuff for you, experts to answer your garment and decorating questions, and of course our opinions and recommendations. As always we turn advertising on its head – and our sponsors were our vendors first. We get folks asking us to be sponsors and if we don’t use them, we don’t recommend them.

Distinctive Designs 21 – Booth #751

These guys are a very solid vendor of ours. They make every kinds of patch, label, hang tag, size strip, zipper pull, and more. They make anything you can think of and many things you never thought of. I highly recommend you stop by their booth and get some inspiration. Owner Mike is a great guy and a real professional. One thing we will be checking out is that they have new COVER UP Heat Transfers – meaning you can now put something over the transfer already put on at the mills, Hanes, Champion, A4 and so on. Also they are doing new performance heat transfers that are super stretchy.

KIWO/ULANO Booths #1546 and #1447

KIWO is the definition of a solid company. They have a been a great partner of Mirror Image through every phase our printing development, from simulated process work to special effects. No other company has given us more rock solid technical advice. Their products are great and they are consistent. We used their emulsions for both resolutions and for wide latitude of exposure. My shop hasn’t gone to DTS yet, but one of my friends with a big shop loves his KIWO unit because it is by far the fastest he has used. Check out the cool new emulsion container that pours from Ulano, that’s a simple good idea.

San Mar – Booths #1303 #1401

If you miss the San Mar booth you are blind. It will be the huge one right when you enter the convention hall. We are part of the PSST system that San Mar set up for contract decorators. If you do contract work you need to check that out and getting an explanation in person is probably the best way, as it is a good program but a bit complicated.

San Mar has been a leader in the industry for a long time in making their products decorator friendly. That is both in terms of design features like pockets that allow easier embroidery access and in terms of technical information like what inks to use on their specialty fabrics. At Long Beach they will have a decoration pavilion that highlights the many unique ways their products can be embellished. Never a dull moment at San Mar– they have 135 new styles and the launch of a new fitness brand, Ogio Endurance. Solving a problem that I’ve heard lots of complaints about from other screenprinters, San Mar will be showing a new no-bleed digital hex camo series in performance tees, fleece and headwear.