中文The global printing industry is in the middle of a prolonged structural reset. Establishment counts are falling, workforces are contracting, and the demand shifts behind the downturn show no sign of reversing. That is the framing from Smithers analyst Jon Harper Smith, author of the new report The Future of Printer Demographics to 2031, who sets out the forces reshaping the competitive landscape.
The contraction is real and sustained. In 2024 there were 353,707 printing and allied-industry establishments across the researched countries — down 7.9 percent from 384,102 in 2019. Employment tells a similar story: the sector employed 3.4 million people in 2024, down 12.7 percent from 3.9 million in 2019. These are structural realignments, not marginal dips, and they predate 2019 before accelerating afterwards.
What is driving it? The deepest force is the long-term decline in physical-print demand, especially in commercial and publication segments. Digital content distribution has battered newspapers, magazines and advertising print; the pandemic accelerated an existing downtrend, and subsequent geopolitical shocks ensured any recovery was short-lived. Compounding this, newer presses are far more productive than the ones they replace, so more output needs fewer machines and fewer plants — rationalisation by productivity.
Sustainability sentiment adds pressure, though with some pushback, as consumers and content owners question the case for physical print. Recruitment remains a persistent headache: across most regions, companies struggle to attract qualified press operators, and the industry is widely seen as unattractive even as newer equipment demands scarcer skills.
Regionally, the picture is lopsided. Asia is by far the largest region — 41.9 percent of global establishments and 55.4 percent of employees in 2024 — and its share has held up better than elsewhere, with employee share even rising slightly since 2019 on the back of population-driven demand and export strength. Latin America and Eastern Europe posted the steepest proportional falls in establishment numbers; North America saw the largest employee decline, followed by Eastern and Western Europe.
To 2031, the decline continues but should slow. Publication and graphic printing keep contracting, though some titles survive as niche or premium physical products. Packaging and labels are explicitly called out as growing segments — a crucial caveat for printers deciding where to invest. Several dynamics shift in the sector’s favour: physical print remains highly effective in advertising, and the rise of AI-generated content has created a trust deficit in digital channels that print does not share.
On skills, enhanced automation in newer press generations is expected to narrow the workforce gap, and the industry is making progress through training. The broader acceptance that remote working has limits also removes one deterrent to press-floor careers. Smithers’ advice to businesses is strategic: the best-positioned players invest in high-productivity equipment, build capability in growing segments, and operate in or supply markets where domestic demand and export strength buffer Western contraction. Asia, the data confirms, will only grow as the anchor of global print.
Source: Print21 (print21.com.au), article “Smithers forecasts leaner global print industry,” by Jan Arreza, published 15 July 2026.
The report’s optimism about packaging and labels is the actionable signal for investors and owners. While commercial print erodes, the converters pivoting into flexible packaging, labels and functional print are positioning for growth even as the overall establishment count shrinks. The future print industry, Smithers implies, will be smaller but more specialised — and Asia will be its centre of gravity.
For equipment makers and material suppliers, the strategic read is to follow the growth. Capacity, R&D and support should concentrate where demand is expanding — packaging, labels and Asian production — rather than where it is structurally declining. The survivors of the next five years will likely be those who reinvented themselves around the resilient segments while managing the long, uneven decline of publication and commodity commercial print.
Smithers also notes a partial offset: physical print retains strong effectiveness in advertising, and the rise of AI-generated content has created a trust deficit in digital channels that print does not share. For printers, that is a slender but real opening to defend certain high-trust, high-impact applications even as the overall base contracts.
The report’s regional lens is its most actionable contribution. By quantifying Asia’s growing share and the steepest declines in the Americas and Eastern Europe, Smithers gives owners a map for where to defend and where to deploy. The leaner industry it forecasts is not a uniform contraction but a redistribution — and positioning for that redistribution is the real strategic task.
The strategic upshot is uncomfortable but clear: the print industry’s future size is shrinking while its centre of gravity shifts east and toward packaging. Owners who read Smithers as a forecast to endure rather than a map to navigate will be the ones consolidated away. Those who reallocate toward growth segments and high-productivity plant will define the leaner, more specialised industry that emerges by 2031.
