Evaluation of label printers

Label printers are very useful tools for many industries today. They are part of the backbone of the international commerce as they are critical components of the retail and shipment industries. This article is focused on the main features of label printers that you need to evaluate if you intend to buy a lot of them to support your operations. We are going to try to give you some advice in order to help you take the best decision based on the most recent available information of the printing market. First of all, you need to know that there are two radically different printing technologies in the market today, one is called direct thermal and the other is called thermal transfer. Well, before you buy a lot of label printers you need to comprehend the features, advantages and disadvantages of these two technologies. The former technology is the cheaper of both, it uses heat sensitive paper, like the one used in fax machines, and it does not use ribbons or ink, so their maintenance cost is very low. Unfortunately, information printed this way is designed to last only for a short time. This last characteristic of the label printers that use direct thermal technology is perfect for shipment companies, which don’t need their labels to last a lot of time, for instance, years. The other technology, thermal transfer, uses both ribbons and inks to produce the barcodes. This increases considerably their maintenance cost but they have the advantage that printings done this way last much longer than the ones printed with the direct thermal methodology. Label printers that use this last technology are more expensive and are used extensively in the retail industry and in other industries that need to store their products for several months. With this information you will be able to take a more informed decision on this topic.