The paradigm shifting impact of the global pandemic upon the printing consumables market continues unabated with further shortages of core raw materials, human resources and logistical services, creating previously unforeseen instability within the printing consumables global supply chain.
Tony Lord President of Flint Group’s CPW (Commercial Publication Web) and OPS (Offset Packaging Solutions) divisions said “this once in a generational event has created a structural scarcity of core raw materials as upstream precursor and primary raw material providers within the supply chain are directing their reduced capacity’s to more lucrative industries than the printing consumables markets. This creates a binary impact of not only shortages of raw materials but an exponential increase in pricing for those raw materials we can obtain.”
Lord continued “as a consequence of our historical relationships with global suppliers of core raw materials, coupled with our extensive manufacturing infrastructure, we believe we are in the best position within the industry to ensure our strategic partners remain supplied with agreed volumes. It is however an unavoidable consequence of prevailing market conditions, that we have no alternative whilst seeking to minimise the impact of price increases, it is inevitable that cost increases will be passed into the supply chain.”
Lord concluded, “We were hopeful the market instability seen during 2021 would have moderated but regrettably we see no possibility of a cessation in prevailing conditions for 2022”.
Recognising this, it is our duty to our partners that at the first opportunity we engage in constructive dialogue to discuss how best we can minimise the impact of the current situation and ensure our partners remain supplied with their needs.