STAPLES STANDS BY PHOTO PAPER

[Anonymous]

Staples stands by photo paper
 May 05
Staples’ top-of-the-line photo paper has been
criticised as the battle over market share in paper, ink and chemicals for digital printing becomes
increasingly aggressive.
Wilhelm Imaging Research, a testing lab in
Grinnell, Iowa, which was recently hired by Hewlett-Packard, denounced
Staples-branded paper, claiming that photos printed on it fade rapidly from
exposure to ozone pollution.
Staples has refuted the claims. A
spokesperson for the company told OPI: “Staples’ brand photo papers have been
tested extensively by the Rochester Institute of Technology and have proven to
offer excellent quality in the areas most important to customers – image quality
and dry time. They also provide flexibility to print on multiple manufacturers’
printers and are optimised for multiple ink
brands.”
With 61 per cent of photo prints now made at home, paper
suppliers such as Staples and Eastman Kodak are facing stiff competition from
printer makers eager to market their own lines of speciality photo paper.

Wal-Mart, meanwhile, is attempting to gain market share by luring its
customers to print digital pictures in store.
Analysts also expect the
market landscape to be pitted with an increasing number of acquisitions of
online photo start-ups. “The pie isn’t necessarily going to get any bigger,”
Frank Baillargeon, an industry consultant in Eagle, Idaho, told Associated
Press, “but it’s going to be sliced up in many different ways.”

[Author]

May 12, 2005 at 11:10 AM