Advantages of Using a Digital Card Printer for Identity Cards

Identity cards are an important part of our daily lives. Examples include driving licences, gym membership cards, library cards and employee id badges.

Digital card printers now make it a simple task for any sized business to produce high security, durable identity cards. The card design and artwork can be created without the need for a design agency. And the printing process is so fast that it takes a few seconds to produce a card.

The old labour intensive method of cutting, pasting and laminating an identity card is fast becoming a thing of the past. Digital printing is a one step process. The information including text, graphics and pictures are all stored on a computer, enabling a replacement card to be easily re- printed.

Security has improved. The traditional laminated method produced identity cards that were easily counterfeited or altered.

Advantages of using a digital card printer for identity cards are:

1) Quality of Photo
The quality of a traditional photograph depends on the camera or photo booth used, and only one copy is produced. A digital image is sharper and can be edited for colour quality. It can be re-sized to fit the card and a copy can be saved if needed for future use.

2) Security
Security measures such as holograms, fingerprint scans, smart chips and barcodes can be integrated into digitally printed cards. The card printers apply a single or dual-sided lamination, which prevents the identity card being easily reproduced or counterfeited.

3) Durability
The lamination or 'overlay varnishes' used by digital card printers make the identity cards resistant to damage from liquids, fading from UV light exposure and damage from abrasion.

4) Cost Effective
Once the digital card printer is purchased, the material used to produce identity cards cost far less than the traditional cut/paste/laminate method. And because it is so simple to produce the cards, third party suppliers are not required.

5) Flexibility
The design software that accompanies a card printer provides the flexibility to change the card's layout, text and artwork whenever required. It can be linked to database programs to store images and card details.

6) Convenience
If changes are needed to the card content or design, identity cards can be re-printed at any time. And a single replacement identity card can be easily re-produced.

A specialist card printer manufacturer like Zebra Card can provide advice about which printer is suitable for an organisation's specific requirements. The initial financial outlay for the hardware is soon repaid by the convenience of producing identity cards in house, the time-saving on labour and cost-saving on materials used.