The introduction of the JV330-160 enabled in-house production of goods and store interiors.　

DORAMA Inc. (Head office: 1F Le Port Matsubara, 1-50-15 Matsubara, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo) is involved in game center operations, anime goods creation, and reuse business. In December 2022, the company introduced Mimaki's JV330-160 eco-solvent inkjet printer as a solution for in-house production of store interiors and pop-ups, in addition to anime-related goods production.
For this interview, we spoke with Mr. Yokoyama, Assistant Manager of DORAMA's Animation & Event Business Department, about how the "JV330-160" was introduced and his impressions after its introduction.

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Conclusive fact in introducing JV330-160

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• Fast printing speed
• Easy operation of familiar RIP software
• Stable and high quality
• Fulfillment of support system
• Efficiency of work with the XY slitter

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Printing quality and speed were decisive factors in our decision to install Mimaki printers.

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The company opened in 1982 as a used book recycling store and has since expanded into the rental, home entertainment, and amusement businesses, as well as anime and game-related projects and merchandise sales since 2018.

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Initially, the Anime & Event Business Department mainly offered food and beverages through collaboration cafes throughout Japan but sensing the influence of the Corona disaster and the growing need for such services, the department began to enter into the production of merchandise.
Originally, they sold goods through their own e-commerce site, but gradually began to sell goods through pop-up stores and other physical stores. When they first started selling goods, they outsourced everything, but additional orders during the busy season and urgent requests were difficult to fulfill, so they began talking about bringing the production in-house, and JV330-160 (hereafter, JV330) was introduced.

The deciding factor in the introduction of JV330 was undoubtedly the speed of production, said Yokoyama, assistant manager of the Animation and Events Division.

We considered printers from other companies, but when it came to print quality and production speed, we concluded that Mimaki was the only choice. Another deciding factor was that the JV330 has an XY slitter, which I thought would be useful for store interiors and pop-up displays. The fact that we could use the JV330 with the RIP software (RasterLink) that we were familiar with for Mimaki's UV printer "UJF-6042MkII e," which we had been using before we installed the JV330, was also attractive. (Mr. Yokoyama)

As Yokoyama says, the JV330 is focused on both high image quality and high production.
In addition, he says, "We need to change the media according to what we are making, so the media changer, which can set up to three media and is easy to switch between them, has been a big help to us."

Currently, about 80% of our merchandise production is done in-house. We produce almost all our merchandise in-house, especially badges and acrylic items, which saves us a lot of money compared to outsourcing. (Mr. Yokoyama)

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For example, to produce can badges, we use a Mimaki machine for the process of imposition and output on synthetic paper using the JV330 and then cutting the backing sheet leaving a little bit of half cut connection points using the CG-160FXII Plus (*cutting plotter). It has been running smoothly without any major problems from the time of its introduction. Ideally, we would like to introduce additional equipment to create a situation where one person is running several printers in parallel while running the business. In addition, the production of goods is going much better than expected, and there is talk of bringing everything in-house, including those not related to goods. Next, we would like to bring in in-house production of banners, tapestries, window decorations with transparent media, etc. (Mr. Yokoyama)

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After the introduction of JV330, it has shown more performance than expected.

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He added, "A new employee recently joined our company, and one of the great strengths of the JV330 is that anyone can produce at the same level as long as they understand how to use it. With manual work, there are inevitably individual differences, but with the machine, the same results can be obtained no matter who presses the buttons, which is very helpful in guaranteeing productivity. Even if there is something we don't understand about the operation, we can almost always find a solution on the Mimaki website or the official YouTube channel, so we are very grateful for that as well," he also says.

In addition to being easy and simple to operate, the fact that beginners and experienced operators can produce products at the same level is another advantage of the JV330 that we realized after its introduction.

And there are questions or problems with a machine, it is common to call the sales representative in charge or the call center to solve the problem, but Mimaki has a comprehensive collection of information on its official website and YouTube. This makes it easy for those who have questions that are not worth asking over the phone or who are not comfortable making phone calls to resolve them on their own.

"When I learned how to operate the system while working on it, it was very easy to do, and I felt a sense of security knowing that if anything went wrong, a single phone call would bring a service engineer or sales representative to my location. We were able to smoothly start up and introduce JV330 within the company," said Yokoyama.

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Moreover, since JV330 is also used to make in-store pop-ups and decorations for the amusement business, the company was able to save the time and expense of outsourcing these items to other companies as well. In-store pop-ups need to be produced in a short period of time with different designs for each season and event, and the ability to produce a wide range of large and small pop-ups in-house is a major advantage of using JV330.

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