Market and the factory floor.

ROQ rates its folding machine at 700 pieces an hour, and the footnote on that figure says it holds for a piece the size of an A4 sheet. A reseller’s page for the same machine advertises up to 800 pieces an hour in its copy, then prints 700 in its specification table. Verdict 70 rates the 800 false. This section puts the market and floor figures of September and October through the same test. Most of what was announced since 21 September still has a draft verdict in our register, so those items cite the makers’ own releases and pages, not our ratings.

Sources: ROQ International · screenprintsupplies.com · Verdict 70

On the floor: a speed belongs to a configuration

M&R’s page for the Gauntlet 4, its automatic carousel press, gives no rated speed. It lists a real-time production speed monitor among the control panel’s features. The only throughput figure on the page is a customer’s testimonial about the older Gauntlet III: 920 pieces an hour on a nine-colour job on dark garments, with a 17-inch print stroke and one flash. Verdict 49 rates false the claim that automatic presses publish a comparable per-hour figure the way DTG makers do. The testimonial is the exception that fits the rule: a number that arrives with its job specification attached.

Sources: M&R Gauntlet 4 · Verdict 49

Label presses are quoted in metres per minute, and the same pattern shows. Durst gives 80 m/min (262 ft/min) for the Tau 340 RSC, and 52 m/min (170 ft/min) for the Tau 340 RSC E, which it says upgrades to 80. Screen lists its Truepress LABEL 350UV SAI E at 50 m/min with 60 as an option, and the S model at 60. Mark Andy states 240 fpm, or 73 m/min, for its Digital Series HD and says the figure holds for every colour, white included. The unit conversions on all three pages check out. What each leaves to the buyer is which configuration, with which options, a number belongs to. Even the trade term, narrow web, has no agreed width.

Sources: Durst Tau 340 RSC · Durst Tau 340 RSC E · Screen Truepress LABEL 350UV SAI series · Mark Andy Digital Series HD

The third kind of floor claim is the figure that is not on its page. A claim that Eton Systems’ unit production system lifts efficiency by 30 to 100% points at the maker’s garment-industry page, which contains no percentage at all and does not use the term (verdict 44).

Sources: Eton Systems, garments · Verdict 44

Market: the number and its scope

Returns first. Eightx puts apparel returns at a 25% median, range 20 to 30%, in a table of benchmarks from its own 35-brand direct-to-consumer portfolio, cross-referenced, it says, with NRF and Shopify data. On the same page Amazon FBA apparel is 35 to 45%, which is 1.4 to 1.8 times the median (our division). The National Retail Federation’s survey of 2,006 consumers and 358 ecommerce professionals at large US merchants estimates 19.3% of online sales returned in 2025, for all categories together and with no apparel line. So a quarter is one firm’s figure for direct-to-consumer brands. Verdict 73 rates the broader claim partly true.

Sources: Eightx · NRF, 15 October 2025 · Verdict 73

Who carries a return decides what the rate costs. Printful’s return policy, last updated on 3 June 2022, says it does not refund orders for buyer’s remorse except for customers living in Brazil. A Brazilian customer must ask within seven days of delivery and send a photo, and no refund is possible if the item was used or destroyed. Elsewhere, returns and size exchanges are at the seller’s expense and discretion. A notice for EU consumers cites Directive 2011/83/EU, whose recital 49 says the right of withdrawal should not apply to goods made to the consumer’s specifications or clearly personalised. The policy text is built in the browser: when we fetched the page over plain HTTP, none of it came back.

Sources: Printful return policy · Directive 2011/83/EU

On share, Future Market Insights puts screen printing at 46.0% of printing-technique sales in the custom T-shirt market in 2026, and the market at USD 5.1 billion, on a report page dated 18 May 2026. That makes screen printing about USD 2.3 billion (our multiplication). Verdict 61 found no second source that states a share, and rates the wider claim, 40 to 60% of decorated apparel, partly true: it rests on one forecaster’s single-year estimate for a narrower market.

Sources: Future Market Insights · Verdict 61

Fees drift in the same way. IngramSpark announced on 19 May 2023 that it would end book setup fees and add a 1% fee on books sold through its wholesale global distribution network. A page from the Alliance of Independent Authors, updated in August 2026, says the global distribution fee has risen from 1.5% to 1.875%, and places the change in a February 2026 pricing update. Neither page says when 1% became 1.5%. Against the original announcement, 1.875% is 1.875 times as much. Verdict 59 rates the setup-fee claim partly true and notes that the 1% figure is out of date.

Sources: IngramSpark, 19 May 2023 · ALLi · Verdict 59

Deals and rate changes since 21 September

Durst said on 21 September that 50 P5 500 TEX iSUB systems have been sold worldwide since the 5.2-metre dye-sublimation printer was introduced at FESPA Global Print Expo 2025. That is sold, not installed, and the release does not say how many are running, although a trade site headlined its report with the word installations. FESPA 2025 opened on 6 May, so 50 systems in about 16.5 months is roughly three a month (our division).

Sources: Durst release, 21 September 2026 · Large Format Review · Print Industry News, FESPA 2025

On 28 September EFI and Agfa announced a definitive agreement to combine Agfa’s Digital Printing Solutions business with EFI. An affiliate of Siris, EFI’s owner, would hold 60% of the jointly held company and Agfa 40%, with the two governing as equal partners. The release puts combined 2026 revenue at about €540 million ($625 million) on a pro forma basis. It calls the transaction proposed and expects it to close by the end of 2026, subject to employee consultation, regulatory approvals and closing conditions. This is an agreement to combine, not a completed deal, and the release states no price.

Sources: EFI and Agfa release, 28 September 2026

THG Fulfil said on 30 September that it will sell AutoStore systems through traditional CapEx ownership as well as the Robotics-as-a-Service model it already offered. It reports operating 796 AutoStore robots. AutoStore’s own release of 2 October says more than 700, and names the second model AutoStore-as-a-Service where THG says Robotics-as-a-Service. The two robot counts are consistent, and the choice on offer, buy the automation or pay for it as a service, is the one the first issue’s smart-factory section followed through THG’s robot sortation and AutoStore’s pay-per-pick fee. The next part is the same question.

Sources: THG Ingenuity release, 30 September 2026 · AutoStore release, 2 October 2026

Royal Mail raised parcel stamp prices by 35p to £1.45 an item on 5 October, about 8% on average, and raised tracked and guaranteed services too. A separate 36% rise for business-mail wholesale was suspended after Ofcom accepted an access operators’ dispute in September. Royal Mail withdrew it and filed lower increases, due in early December.

Sources: Print Monthly, 5 October 2026

One headline that week needs its scope read. Printwear & Promotion ran a release on 5 October from Enginuity: almost 80% of the SMEs it surveyed feel under pressure to raise prices, and almost three quarters would pass costs on. The release speaks of engineering and manufacturing and gives no sample size. Nothing in it concerns garment decoration, so it is no evidence yet about decorators’ prices.

Sources: Printwear & Promotion, 5 October 2026

Paying for the machine

For tax years beginning in 2026 the US Section 179 limit is $2,560,000, reduced dollar for dollar once a business places more than $4,090,000 of qualifying property in service, so it reaches zero at $6,650,000 (our sum). IRS Publication 946 says a 100% special depreciation allowance applies to qualified property acquired and placed in service after 19 January 2025, unless the taxpayer elects out. In the UK the annual investment allowance is £1 million, unchanged since 1 January 2019. Full expensing deducts 100% of the cost of new, unused plant and machinery, but only for companies. A 40% first-year allowance applies to qualifying plant bought on or after 1 January 2026.

Sources: IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-32 · IRS Publication 946 · gov.uk, annual investment allowance · gov.uk, full expensing · gov.uk, 40% first-year allowance

The lender figures reconcile. The Equipment Leasing and Finance Association’s CapEx Finance Index for August, published on 29 September, reports $11.8 billion of new business volume, seasonally adjusted, 17.3% below July’s record $14.3 billion. Subtracting the rounded figures gives 17.5%, inside rounding. Its credit approval rate fell 2.0 points to 75.4%, the lowest since February 2025, so about one application in four went unapproved. The small-ticket rate is 78.2% and delinquency 1.8%. The association ties July’s surge to AI-related investment, so the series says little about print shops in particular.

Sources: ELFA CapEx Finance Index, August 2026

The vendor offers are less checkable. Brother’s page offers the GTX300 at $384 a month at 3.9% over 48 months, on new transactions completed through 31 December 2026. The date was 30 September when we first read the page on 8 September, so the offer has been extended. Forty-eight payments come to $18,432, and a loan at 3.9% that this payment repays over 48 months would be about $17,040 (our calculation). The page names no machine price, down payment, residual value or lease type, so a reader cannot check the payment against anything. The lease type matters. Roland DGA’s finance page puts the $1 buyout and the 10% purchase-upon-termination lease among the types that let the lessee use Section 179, and the 10% option and fair-market-value lease among true leases, the last with the lowest payment. Epson’s newsroom says, in a release from 19 January 2018, that Direct Capital provides its financing and that Epson offers none directly. We found no newer statement.

Sources: Brother DTG promotions · Roland DGA financial services · Epson America, 19 January 2018