Welcome to the future—digital printing

24 Mar 2025 • 2 minute read

Save time, stop waste and faster turnarounds; digital printing is taking over the gift card industry. So, how can your business make the most of this innovation?

The gift card industry has become a cornerstone of modern retail. It offers brands a powerful way to drive sales, enhance customer loyalty, and adapt to evolving shopping trends. According to recent market research, the global gift card market is currently valued at approximately $1.15 trillion in 2024, with projections to reach around $9.05 trillion by 2037, demonstrating significant growth potential. Fuelled by the rise of digital gifting and e-commerce, the sector is predicted to grow and grow.

Digital print on paperboard marks the beginning of a revolution in gift card products, transforming how they are produced through greater efficiency, customisation, and sustainability—delivering greater efficiency, customisation, and sustainability. Green Gift Cards leads in this shift, dedicated to pioneering sustainable solutions. All of our solutions reduce environmental impact while keeping quality and performance high. 
Whilst the industry is moving beyond PVC plastic to eco-friendly paperboard material, the next challenge is to combine sustainability with new technology. Continued print and software innovation will help shape the future of the gift card market. 

What is digital printing?

Digital sheet-fed printing uses an electrostatic process where an image is created on a photoconductor, and toner particles are attracted to the charged areas of the photoconductor. This technique directly applies digital files (such as PDFs and JPGs) to our paperboard cards. This method eliminates the need for traditional printing plates, reducing waste and setup time. Digital printing allows for on-demand production, shorter runs, and enhanced customisation.
 
Key Features of Digital Printing:

• No Printing Plates - Unique to the digital printing method is the lack of printing plates. This allows ink or toner to be applied directly to the material, reducing setup time and costs.
• High Customisation - Each print can be unique or branded for a specific campaign, individual customer or event. This allows for variable data printing, such as personalised gift cards or serialised barcodes.
• Efficiency & Speed - Reduced set-up times and no ‘ready make’ lead to a faster turnaround time compared to offset printing. Turnaround goes from months to weeks. Ideal for quick production.
• Eco-Friendly Advantages - No ‘ready-make’ reduces material waste and uses less ink. When paired with reduced energy usage for digital presses and sustainable materials like paperboard instead of PVC plastic. Digital printing has a huge impact on reducing the CO2 produced in production. 

As champions of change and industry disruptors, Green Gift Cards are once again leading the way for the gift card industry to meet the increasing demand for sustainable solutions. We believe that digital printing will be instrumental in producing even more eco-friendly, high-quality, customisable, and sustainable cards, while also meeting business needs to reduce their carbon footprint without compromising on quality or price. 

What is the impact on the gift card industry?

Traditional printing methods such as lithography (litho) mass-produce gift cards and offer high-quality results, but they have several limitations:

• High Setup Costs & Large Print Runs - They require expensive printing plates and bulk production, making small runs costly and inefficient.
• Limited Customisation - Each batch must be identical, making personalisation difficult and restricting retailers to generic designs.
• Environmental Concerns - Many gift cards are printed on PVC plastic, which is difficult to recycle and contributes to plastic waste.

As the industry shifts toward personalisation, sustainability, and on-demand production, traditional methods struggle to keep pace and maintain competitive costs.

What are the benefits of digital printing for you?

Digital printing has transformed the way customers interact with gift cards, offering greater creative flexibility, personalisation, and sustainability. In the gift card industry and beyond, these advantages directly enhance the customer experience.

1. Easy personalisation & customisation
   Customers can add names, messages, or unique designs to gift cards, creating a more personal and meaningful experience that is relevant to the card holder. 
   
   Variable data printing allows for individualised elements like unique barcodes, QR codes, and card numbers to be printed at the same time the artwork is. This removes an entire offline process associated with traditional production practices.
   
   Retailers can offer limited-edition or seasonal designs. Allowing them to target localised audiences and events giving customers more choices.
2. Faster Turnaround Times
   On-demand printing means eco gift cards are printed quickly and have a shorter turnaround time, even for custom gift cards. Wait times go from 6+ weeks to a week!
   
   Businesses can offer quicker delivery times on custom-printed gift cards and gift card packaging.
3. Higher Print Quality & Durability
   The new Ricoh Pro C9500 digital press, the new press we helped develop sharp images, vibrant colours, and precise details, making stand-out designs.
   
   Smudge-proof and fade-resistant inks ensure that printed gift cards last longer with more production techniques, embellishments, and finishing options available, digital printing offers much more than traditional print.
4. Increased Sustainability & Eco-Friendly Options
   There is no need for printing remake-readies that waste material.
   
   Uses less ink and fewer resources, reducing environmental impact.
   
   Produces a lot less Co2 than traditional lithography, lowering the Co2 footprint of each card product.
5. More Availability & Accessibility
   Digital printing enables short-run printing with a MOQ of just 500 cards. This enables niche or small-batch products to be more widely available.
   
   Localised and independent brands can now set up gift, loyalty and membership programmes cost-effectively.
   
   Customers can choose from a wider variety of gift card designs and packaging design options.
6. Seamless Integration with Digital Platforms
   The ability for QR codes and smart gift cards allows customers to easily redeem or check balances online.
   
   Digital printing supports hybrid gifting—physical cards that can be linked to a digital experience and mobile wallets or apps.

Green Gift Cards and Ricoh partnership

Green Gift Cards has partnered with Ricoh to revolutionise the gift card, loyalty and membership card industry by producing eco-friendly, paper-based cards using the Ricoh Pro C9500 digital colour sheetfed press. This collaboration focuses on sustainability and innovation, offering a viable alternative to traditional plastic gift cards.

Key Aspects of the Partnership:

• Sustainable production - The Ricoh Pro C9500 enables each card to emit just 4.28g CO2e compared to 46.97g CO2e for traditional plastic cards, representing a 91% reduction in carbon footprint.
• Advanced gift card printing services - The Pro C9500 can print on heavy, calliper paper stock up to 800 microns thick, resulting in durable and sustainable gift cards, packaging and even POS that meet market demands for eco-friendly alternatives.
• Industry collaboration - Tag Systems UK, a leading European gift, loyalty and banking card specialist, has invested in the Ricoh Pro C9500 to spearhead sustainable gift and loyalty card production with Green Gift Cards cards. 

This partnership between Green Gift Cards and Ricoh is disrupting the industry through the innovative capabilities of the Pro C9500 press. Underpinned by a laser focus on sustainability, the collaboration delivers high-quality, vibrant, and attractive products, providing environmentally friendly gift card solutions aligning with the growing consumer and corporate demand for sustainable practices.

This paradigm shift offers commercial printers the opportunity to enter new markets that, up until now, have been dominated by the few expert plastic card printers. With more and more PSPs (Print Service Providers) around the world investing in the Pro C9500, Green Gift Cards is building a network of trusted, capable partners who can produce locally anywhere customers need it. This local solution means a lower carbon footprint due to less transport - the main contributor to the environmental impact of producing cards.

The future of digital printing

The future of digital printing in the gift card industry is set to be driven by customers' demand for sustainability, personalisation, and smart technology. As brands move away from PVC plastic cards towards paperboard gift cards, digital printing takes the production of eco-friendly plastic-free gift cards to the next level, further reducing waste and minimising the carbon footprint of production. 

The ability to print short-run, event-specific, or limited-edition cards cost-effectively will provide both large and small businesses with greater flexibility, helping them become more relevant to their audience.

Beyond sustainability, smart and connected cards will revolutionise customer experiences. With NFC, RFID, and QR code integration, gift cards will seamlessly link to mobile wallets, loyalty programs, and blockchain security systems. This will improve fraud prevention, enable instant redemption, and create interactive gifting experiences through augmented reality (AR). 

Take the Next Step in Sustainable Gift Cards

Digital printing is revolutionising the gift card industry—offering faster production, greater personalisation, and a lower environmental impact. As brands move towards sustainable paperboard alternatives, now is the time to embrace the next generation of gift cards.

At Green Gift Cards, we are committed to helping businesses reduce their carbon footprint while delivering customised, high-quality printed gift cards, loyalty and membership cards. Whether you're looking to enhance your brand’s sustainability, offer unique designs, or improve efficiency, we’re here to help.

Get in touch today to explore how digital printing and sustainable gift cards can benefit your business. Let’s shape the future of gifting together!