Chromaluxe Panel Prices

[Alistair]

Anyone here printing Chromalux (Dan?). If so, have the prices climbed a lot since late last year? Here in NZ the supplier has increased prices a lot. What are you seeing in the US? Presumably it is made in the US so freight should not affect it to the same extent as down here. We are now at NZ$670 for a full sheet (4’x8’/1200x2400mm) ouch! Is it still a popular product?

[dgberg]

Still buying from Lexjet but if you are buying the larger sizes then you have to deal with the crating fee.(You will have that regardless) Here in the states it is $250. I don't like handling those larger sheets so have been buying the 40x60's and cutting those down. The square footage price is based pretty much off the amount of waste they have to deal with and the extra cutting labor. There are still some larger sizes selling right around $10 a sq. ft. You will also see some of the smaller sizes up around $20 a sq. ft. I stay away from those at all cost if possible. A couple of years ago when they had the bigger increases we had to raise our prices to cover the increases and took a pretty big hit> We lost about 40% of our Chromaluxe business. Customers are savvy and quite a few of the dealers never adjusted their pricing to cover the increases. All it takes is a Google search or two and you can check pricing anywhere in the country. We are presently sitting at $45 a square. ft. for wholesale which is pretty much for many that are reselling. Refuse to go lower and get in that race to the bottom. Getting a large crate of this product shipped halfway around the world has to be challenging at best from a cost standpoint.

For example 36x36 is $22.67 a sq. ft. and a 4x8 sheet is $9.63 a sq. ft. ($318.08) plus the $250 crating fee.
10 full sheets are $3180.00 plus that $250.

[Alistair]

Thanks for your comprehensive answer Dan, much appreciated. Once the crating charge is included, our price actually sounds about right. NZD6,700 for 10 sheets all up including shipping. Exchange rate is around 56c so ~NZD3700. Does it still sell well in your market? What sizes are most popular?
How do you cut yours? We have a Summa flatbed and think we can probably but ok on that but am a little concerned how much hand finishing will be required to deal with chips etc. It certainly is a high end product, not one to compete on price with! A well printed Chromaluxe panel is hard to beat for the right image though IMO, but not for the faint hearted!

[dgberg]

Cutting ours with our SCMI sliding table saw with aluminum blade. Not ideal but works very well. We have a jointer with helical head that we use to get rid of edge chips and saw marks.
We have a quarter round punch to re round the corners from Accucutter.

[Alistair]

Looks like a good setup, thanks Dan.