Customer Case – Spotlight on Hit-Product OEM: How Two Traditional Factories Compete Across Sectors to Drive Efficiency

As a bellwether of China's trend-driven consumer goods market, Yiwu — with its well-established processing and supply chain — is always among the first to capture emerging market opportunities. Recently, the perler bead craft sector has seen explosive growth, driving a steady stream of customized orders for storage boxes, decorative card accessories, and other small items.

Two traditional factories, originally focused on cutting and injection molding, have deployed the MEST Print Vision UV Printer to keep pace with the rapid turnover of hit products — efficiently handling both high-volume batch orders and complex small-piece processing. With stable, high-performance printing capacity, they’ve achieved what might be called "Yiwu Speed."

01

Plastic Products Factory

Injection Molding for Mass Production of Hit Perler Bead Boards

Combining personalized creativity with social sharing appeal, "perler bead" crafts have become a cultural phenomenon in today's market. While perler bead boards rely on conventional injection molding equipment, the high cost of mold development and the low value-added nature of injection-molded semi-finished products remain key challenges.

A plastic products factory in Yiwu keenly identified that integrating UV printing with injection molding could unlock significant product premium. This strategic move laid a solid foundation for capitalizing on the perler bead trend.

“Most of the processing orders we take with UV printing are plastic products,” the factory head explained. “Semi-finished parts from our injection molding subsidiary are sent here for printing, and the perler bead boards are handled the same way. Right now, all four of our MEST Print Vision UV Printers are running perler bead board jobs — the order volume is substantial.”

As a DIY crafting tool, perler bead boards often feature intricate linework and small color blocks, with noticeable height variations across the board surface. This places high demands on the precision and stability of the UV printer.

“We're in the peak production season right now, so the equipment basically runs 24/7,” the factory head commented. “The print quality is very stable, and the software is straightforward — easy to pick up. A batch of perler bead boards takes only about 15 minutes to print. It's really efficient.”

In terms of production capacity, a single machine turns out up to 3,000 pieces per day. From per-batch efficiency to roundtheclock capacity delivery, the MEST Print Vision UV Printer has earned customer trust through its solid, reliable performance.

Within less than a year of installation, the factory has placed three additional orders for the equipment – a clear testament to the reliability and production efficiency of the MEST Print Vision UV Printer, and a strong enabler for traditional factories to respond swiftly to emerging market trends.

02

Jansen Crafts

From Cutting to Customized Printing for Diverse, Small-Batch Orders

The transformation path of Jansen Crafts represents a different direction of upgrading for traditional processing factories.

“Back when we were doing laser cutting,” recalls General Manager Wu, “a day's revenue was only a few hundred yuan. Meanwhile, some of our peers who had moved into UV printing were making a net profit of three to four thousand yuan per day.” That stark contrast is exactly what drove him to pivot to UV contract printing three years ago.

As market demand for high-precision finishing continued to grow, General Manager Wu began to explore UV printers with vision positioning capabilities. After comparing several brands, it was the sustained professional follow-up from the MEST Print service team that ultimately won him over.

“Our flatbed printer is a common brand you see on the market. Before bringing in a vision-guided UV printer, we looked into quite a few suppliers. MEST Print entered the industry relatively late, but their pre-sales service was already top-notch — very proactive in sample testing and highly collaborative. That's really what made us willing to try a new brand,” Wu admitted.

The core advantages of the MEST Print Vision UV Printer have been fully validated on the shop floor at Jansen Crafts. Unlike conventional flatbed models that rely on jigs and fixtures, the MEST Print Vision UV Printer enables free placement of products, with automatic recognition, positioning, and pattern matching. When product height and thickness are consistent, it can intelligently assign different patterns to different items and print them simultaneously.

“The vision-equipped printer is spot-on for small items — precise and labor-saving. One operator can easily handle two machines, and a single unit can consistently turn out five to six thousand small pieces per day. For high-value orders, the machine pays for itself within just a few months; for high-volume, lower-margin orders, the payback period is naturally longer.”

In General Manager Wu's view, the MEST Print Vision UV Printer has not only delivered a dual upgrade in efficiency and precision, but also equipped the factory with the core capability to flexibly handle fragmented, small-batch orders — serving as a key driver in Jansen Crafts' transformation from traditional cutting processing to high-value-added UV contract manufacturing.

03

Conclusion

Though starting from different points and operating in distinct sectors, both factories have made the same choice — equipping themselves with the MEST Print Vision UV Printer as their core solution for navigating hit-product cycles and fragmented, small-batch orders.

Whether it's high-volume round-the-clock production of perler bead boards, or flexible handling of scattered small-piece orders, MEST Print delivers stable equipment, efficient collaboration, and a professional service team — empowering customers to achieve "Yiwu Speed" in a highly competitive market.