Rising demand for automated DTO printing as manufacturers tackle labour and skills gaps

Engineered Printing Solutions (EPS) is seeing growing demand for automated direct to object (DTO) printing systems as manufacturers across multiple markets respond to labour shortages, skills gaps, and the push for more integrated, efficient production.

The trend has helped drive EPS beyond the milestone of 100 single pass DTO systems, reflecting a broader shift in how manufacturers now evaluate decoration technology.

Across plastics, packaging, medical, industrial, and promotional applications, manufacturers are increasingly focused not just on print quality but on how decoration can be automated, standardised, and integrated more tightly into production. Demand is being driven by the need to reduce manual labour, improve consistency across shifts, and build more scalable manufacturing workflows.

The growth reflects the wider move away from labour intensive decoration processes and toward automation ready production cells that combine printing with robotics, pre-treatment, vision inspection, and material handling. This aligns with broader industry pressures. Nearly half of respondents to the Plastics Machinery & Manufacturing’s annual survey said labour shortages had a negative effect on their businesses in 2025, and 57% said they plan to buy robots or other automation equipment in 2026.

‘Manufacturers are not just looking for a better way to print. They are looking for a better way to produce,’ said Kenneth Stack, executive chairman of EPS. ‘What we are seeing across markets is growing demand for decoration systems that reduce labour dependency, address skills challenges, and fit into a more automated, integrated manufacturing environment.’

EPS has identified that in many decoration environments, labour is the largest contributor to true cost per part, with training, turnover, manual set up, and shift to shift variation often outweighing consumables. Its position is that the value of DTO comes not just from digital print capability, but from the ability to engineer labour out of the process and create stable, repeatable production systems. The business recently set out that case in more detail in its white paper, ‘The Shift in Direct to Object Printing’, which outlines how single pass UV inkjet can improve return on investment through lower set up costs, greater labour efficiency, and faster payback in suitable applications. EPS reports these trends in print applications spanning plastics, packaging, promotional goods, medical, industrial, and consumer products.

‘We are seeing a progression from operator assisted automation to semi-autonomous operation and ultimately lights out decoration, where parts move through printing, curing, inspection, and tracking with minimal human intervention,’ said Kenneth. ‘As decoration becomes more integrated into manufacturing workflows, quality becomes more consistent, traceability improves, and changeovers become more recipe-driven and predictable. That is what is driving automation growth in DTO and interest in our printing systems.’