The printing industry is one that can never go out of fashion. People will continue to print for several years to come. Although there will be constant innovation as time goes on, however, the need for printing businesses to protect themselves against risks brought about business insurance for printing companies.
Printing companies in the USA can handle lots of different services, like making business cards, wrapping cars, designing product packaging, creating branded T-shirts, and much more. Whatever your printing needs are, you will always find a company to serve you.
Printing companies, just like every other business, are open to risks, and only the best insurance coverage can protect them from unforeseen situations.
Every business is different, so your printer insurance policy will be tailored to fit your specific needs and situation.
However, nearly every printing business share some common factors, such as having expensive equipment and working with flammable materials.
Here are the things you should know to make sure your printing company is protected against unexpected events that may happen in the process of doing your job or within your business premises.
What is printing insurance?
Printing insurance is a type of coverage designed to protect printing businesses from various risks and liabilities associated with their operations. It typically includes coverage for property damage, liability claims, equipment breakdowns, business interruptions, and other specific risks that printing businesses may face.
Who needs printer insurance?
Any business that offers copying or printing services must buy comprehensive insurance coverage to protect themselves and their clients from unforeseen risks.
The most common types of printing companies offer several services, including:
- Business card printing
- Brochure
- Flyer printing
- Poster printing
- Banner printing
- Label printing
- Letterhead
- Envelope
- Booklet printing
- Catalog printing
- Magazine printing
- Newspaper printing
- Packaging
- T-shirt printing
- Signage
- Wallpaper
- Vehicle wrap
- Promotional product printing
3 Reasons why printing companies need insurance
At first, printing might seem pretty safe and low-risk, especially for small business owners. But actually, printer insurance has lots of advantages for businesses of all sizes.
1. To lower the chances of risk
Even if you’re running a small business or working from home, you still face liability risks. You might need protection from things like lawsuits from employees, copyright infringement, costs related to employee injuries, fires, car accidents, product liability, and several other things that are not mentioned here.
When you have a comprehensive business insurance policy for your printing company, you can stop stressing about these situations and concentrate on running your business smoothly.
2. Top protect your business assets against risks
Printing equipment like electrostatic, thermographic, and rotogravure printers is expensive, and not all printing businesses can even afford them.
Apart from the printing equipment, you also have the materials you work with, such as ink and paper, and your stock of finished goods. In most cases, you can even be the owner of the land and building where you do your business.
If you lose, break, or something happens to all these assets, it could cost you a heavy amount of money to replace them—like hundreds of thousands of dollars. That’s where you will need printer insurance because it helps you get back the money you’ve invested if something happens to your property.
3. Compliance with the law and a requirement for clients
In almost every state, if you have one or more employees, you must have workers compensation insurance. And in many places, certain types of businesses need to have commercial auto insurance too. It’s like a rule to make sure everyone’s protected.
Please confirm the type of insurance that your state requires from printing companies. Besides what the law says, remember that lots of clients expect specific insurance standards from the businesses they deal with. For example, they might want you to have at least $1 million in printer errors and omissions (E&O) insurance coverage. Errors and omissions insurance is another name for professional liability insurance.
7 Best Business Insurance for Printing Companies
Printer insurance isn’t just about protecting your assets or covering liabilities—it’s more complicated than that. Here’s a simple breakdown of insurance coverage for printing companies:
1. General Liability Insurance
Commercial general liability (CGL) insurance is a safety net for printing businesses. It helps cover you if someone gets hurt on your property or if you accidentally damage someone else’s property while doing your work.
Here’s an example: Let’s say a customer slips on some spilled ink in your shop. The premises liability part of your insurance would step in to cover the costs if they sued you. And if one of your products has a defect that ends up causing harm, your insurance would cover that too.
2. Property Insurance
Commercial property insurance protects you and your business from risks. It covers your physical assets safe from fires, thefts, and natural disasters that may occur on your business premises. And get this—it’s made up of two main parts.
Building insurance coverage takes care of your building itself, including fixtures and any big machines that are installed permanently in your business premises, such as your printing machine. On the other hand, business personal property covers things like your furniture, stock, and equipment that can be moved around with the business premises, such as computers.
It is important to know that you might save some money by bundling your commercial property insurance with your general liability in something called a business owner’s policy (BOP). It’s like getting a combo deal for your insurance needs.
3. Printers Errors and Omissions (E&O) Insurance
Printers errors and omissions (E&O), or professional liability insurance, steps in when there are financial losses due to professional errors, such as misprints or inaccuracies in your work. It’s there to cover you if things don’t go exactly as planned.
Here’s a scenario: Let’s say you printed the wrong price in a catalog, and because of that, your client lost money. They could take legal action against you to get their losses back, and that’s when your E&O insurance would step in to cover it.
Furthermore, you can also include “correction of work expense” in your printer’s errors and omissions policy. This does a similar job, but it covers the costs of correcting whatever mistakes might have happened, such as reprinting materials.
4. Workers Compensation Insurance
The workers’ compensation insurance covers your employees if they get hurt while working, by covering their medical bills, lost wages, and disability benefits. The workers compensation insurance also covers your business from possible legal actions from your staff related to the injury they suffered.
In every state except Texas, it’s a must for businesses to have workers’ compensation insurance. However, the rules are different depending on your state, so I will advise you to check out the laws in your state to make sure you are not breaking them.
Even if you’re a sole proprietor and manage your business all by yourself, having workers’ compensation insurance can be helpful. It protects you from work-related injury costs that your health insurance might not fully cover.
5. Commercial Auto Insurance
Lots of printing companies need to move their products around, whether it’s from their manufacturing location to their warehouse or directly to their customers.
If you’ve got vehicles that belong to your business, having commercial auto insurance is a must. It’s there to cover things like property damage and medical expenses if one of your employees gets involved in an auto accident while driving to deliver a product to a customer or for any other business activities.
6. Cyber Liability Insurance
With modern printing being digital and all, using software and cloud-based technology, there’s a risk of data breaches and cyber attacks. These attacks can expose your sensitive business information and put it at risk.
In all, cyber liability insurance shields your business against the costs that come with dealing with cyber attacks and data breaches.
7. Employment Practices Liability Insurance
Although this policy is not common among small businesses, employment practices insurance covers your business when it comes to claims of wrongful termination, discrimination, or harassment. It helps cover the costs of legal fees, defense expenses, and other related costs that might come up during these situations.
If you’re running a big printing business and you’re not directly overseeing your recruitments, or in some cases, your business goes through regular ups and downs that could lead to layoffs, employment practices insurance is absolutely essential.
These situations can increase your risk of facing lawsuits related to employment issues. Therefore, having employment practices insurance in place can save you from financial trouble down the line.
Instances of Printer Insurance Claims in Real-World Scenarios
Business owners hope they never have to deal with filing insurance claims—and if you’re one of the lucky ones who never has to, that’s great news.
From my experience in the insurance industry, I often come across claims for printing companies, and here are two common examples:
Scenario One
- Insurance Type: Commercial Property Insurance
- Event: Warehouse Fire
- Business type: Digital photo printing studio
- Incident: One common example is when there is a malfunction in a digital printer and it leads to a fire outbreak on your business premises. If the building contains a lot of paper products, like in a printing business, the fire can spread fast and cause significant damage.
- Insurance coverage: The insurance claim would typically cover compensation for things like repairing the equipment, replacing damaged prints, fixing any structural damage to the building, and covering the income lost during the downtime when the business couldn’t operate.
Scenario Two
- Insurance type: Workers Compensation Insurance
- Event: Repetitive Strain Injury
- Business type: T-shirt printing company
- Incident: Another example is when a loyal employee like Jane develops carpal tunnel syndrome from performing repetitive tasks every day for five years.
- Insurance coverage: Workers compensation claim to cover her medical expenses and any lost wages during her recovery period.
Top Insurance Challenges for Printing Companies
There are different types of printing businesses, depending on the size, equipment used, and number of employees. As your insurance broker puts in the effort to make a custom insurance quote for you, you might encounter some challenges that could change your rates. These challenges include the following:
1. Wood-frame buildings without sprinkler systems
So, if you run a printing business and your office premises are full of paper or things that can catch fire easily and your building frame is made of wood without a sprinkler system, it might be hard to find cheap property insurance.
When your office is filled with paper products that can easily ignite fire and a wood-frame building, fires can spread fast and be tough to control. So, because there’s more damage, it’s harder to get insurance for your business.
2. Buildings without alarms
Most printing shops have lots of finished and unfinished work, working materials, and costly printing machines. As a matter of fact, some printing chemicals can attract thieves due to how expensive they are.
Without an alarm system in your building, there’s a higher chance that these properties could get stolen by thieves. Insurance companies know about this risk, so they might make you pay extra for printer insurance. Sometimes, it could even end up costing more than installing a simple alarm system.
3. Industries with high-risk levels
Most insurance companies in the USA will not cover printing businesses whose clients are from adult content, betting, weapons production, politicians, or other industries that are prohibited.
A seasoned agent near me might be able to help you find a specialized insurer capable of covering businesses operating in high-risk industries.
4. Building Coverage vs. Equipment
Machines that are permanently installed are usually covered under your building insurance, while those that are not permanently installed are seen as part of the contents of your building.
Therefore, printers should ensure that every pieces of working equipment is properly covered under the right section of their property insurance policy.
Here’s an example: If you rent the building you are using for your printing business but have machinery that has been installed permanently in it, then that machine needs to be covered by building insurance coverage. You know that printing equipment costs a lot, so make sure it is adequately covered in this regard.
5. Delivery Operations
Many printing companies offer delivery services as an added bonus to encourage repeat business from customers. The truth is that by having their own delivery trucks, they also take on some of the risks that come with owning business vehicles.
To help lower the cost of your commercial auto insurance, it’s a good idea to put in place policies such as conducting routine checks on vehicle records for all drivers that are driving your vehicles and ensuring they receive standard training.
4 Best Insurers for Printing Companies in the United States
Printer insurance companies are not the same, and they differ in terms of coverage and quality. Here are the best insurance companies for printing businesses in the USA:
1. EMC Insurance
EMC is our top pick for printer insurance because of their competitive rates and strong track record of excellence. They provide comprehensive coverage tailored to the printing industry and can offer any type of insurance coverage for printing companies.
2. Chubb
Chubb is a good insurance company for printing businesses that need protection against risks. One good thing about Chubb that makes them standout from their competitors is that they provide the necessary coverage that printing businesses need and specialty policies such as property warehouse coverage. So, going with Chubb for your printing company’s insurance is a smart move.
3. Hiscox
Hiscox offers specialized business insurance solutions, including tailored packages for printing companies. Their printing business insurance plans cover damage to property, liability issues, interruptions to business, when equipment breaks down, and more. Hiscox is great because they let you customize your policy, and their customer service is top-notch.
4. The Hartford
The Hartford has some of the best insurance plans for printing companies in the USA. Their coverages include property, liability, workers’ compensation, and business interruption coverage. The good thing is that they understand the printing industry so well and know the risks associated with it. Therefore, they are working around the clock to give you the best coverage options to address them.
How to Save Money on Business Insurance for Printing Companies
Inasmuch as we want to protect our properties from unforeseen risks, it is also important to save money on our policies. Here are five effective ways printing companies can reduce insurance costs:
- Shop Around for Quotes: Don’t settle for the first insurance quote you receive. Shop around and compare prices from different insurance providers to find the best deal that suits your printing company’s needs and budget.
- Bundle Policies: Consider bundling multiple insurance policies, such as general liability, property, and commercial auto insurance, with the same provider. Insurance companies often offer discounts for bundling, which can result in significant savings for your printing business.
- Implement Risk Management Practices: Invest in robust risk management practices to minimize the likelihood of accidents, property damage, or liability claims. This may include regular equipment maintenance, safety training for employees, and implementing safety protocols in the workplace. You may qualify for lower insurance premiums by reducing risks.
- Review and Update Coverage Regularly: Regularly review your insurance coverage to ensure it adequately protects your printing business without unnecessary costs. As your business grows or changes, your insurance needs may evolve, so it’s essential to update your coverage accordingly to avoid overpaying for insurance you don’t need.
- Maintain a Good Claims History: Maintain a clean claims history by promptly addressing any incidents or accidents that occur in the workplace. Report claims to your insurance provider promptly, and work closely with them to resolve claims efficiently.
- Consider Higher Deductibles: Choosing higher deductibles on your insurance policies can lower your premiums. However, make sure you have enough cash flow to cover the deductible amount in case of a claim.
Conclusion: Best Business Insurance for Printing Companies
The printing industry is one that comes with a lot of risks. Printers should ensure that their businesses are adequately covered in the event of unforeseen events.
You need printer insurance that is customized to meet your business needs. Therefore, you should consider the size of your business, your services, the building where you do your business, your stock, and other important factors.
I know that you won’t be happy if you file an insurance claim only to discover that you are underinsured. Ensure your printing business is protected. Buy customized insurance coverage for your printing company today to safeguard your assets and operations.