First established in 2003, Innova Art celebrates 20 years in the fine art inkjet media market this year.
One of the first inkjet media manufacturers established in the 21st Century, the company is still run by two of the original founders. As part of the twentieth anniversary celebrations, Mike Ramos-Gonzalez and Wayne Connelly sat down to reminisce over the last two decades.
Based on opposite sides of the Atlantic, Mike and Wayne have worked closely for years. Including a decade in the fine art paper industry before they set up Innova Art.
“We set up Innova Art to broaden the market,” says Wayne Connelly, from the USA. “We believed we could help the market to develop by introducing more economical products with the same high quality as existing products in the market at the time.”
“We were driven by 21st Century thinking around 21st Century applications,” adds Mike Ramos-Gonzalez, from the UK.
Innova Art quickly became established as one of the top three players in the archival inkjet media market. “Our go to market strategy is very different from our competitors…we’re the white box own-branding alternative.” Mike muses.
“Our initial thinking was the fast will eat the big” Wayne interjects.
The company has grown beyond initial predictions from the founders. With more staff and more equipment than they ever planned to invest in twenty years ago. “In the past five years we’ve put in more key personnel so we are not making every decision…It’s more than we planned at the start but it’s also more than we knew we needed.” Observes Wayne.
“We have a facility that specialises in the conversion of digital fine art materials that is second to none in the world…We’re proud of what is here.” Mike summarises.
The initial plan may have evolved along he way but one thing has stayed true: Innova Art has always tried to think different. From developing a product that brought photographers out of the darkroom, to opening innovative new channels. The ambition to tackle challenges from a new perspective has never diminished.
“We try not to look at the market from just a legacy perspective, we try and focus on what the market needs,” Mike explains. “Photographers wanted a product to get them out of the darkroom and we delivered it through the baryta-type FibaPrint® paper.”
“We try and maximise all the opportunities we see” Wayne agrees. “We were very successful in the photo retail market at the initial launch of JetMaster®. As we got further into that market, other opportunities continued to evolve.”
“It’s what Innova Art brings to the world – this little innovative business that always tried to keep at the cutting edge of what customers need.” Concludes Mike.
Read the full interview with Mike and Wayne in The Journey Continues…Celebrating 20 Years. A product of Innova Art’s in-house design studio, the book commemorates the first twenty years of the company: following the journey through press cuttings, news articles and adverts collected and created by the marketing team over the years.