The Bristol signmaking and graphics art supplier will hold an open house on 7 and 8 November at its offices in West Almondsbury.

The Spandex open house will include hands-on workshops and demonstrations of new equipment.

Spandex marketing manager Gabriela Parish said the idea of the event was to introduce people to new products and new ways of using old ones.

"It’s an opportunity to come and learn about things you didn’t know were available and how to use your existing products in ways that will help grow your business," she said.

Spandex will use the open house as a chance to demonstrate its newly acquired range of Roland DG VersaCAMM printer/cutters.

There will also be demonstrations of the SwissQprint Impala inkjet printer, the Epson SureColor SC-S30600 Colour Ink-jet printer and The Gerber Edge FX thermal printer.

Workshops over the two days will include instruction on vehicle wrapping using Avery Supreme Wrapping Film and 3M 2080. There will also be a workshop on printing transfers onto Transflex film for textile marking.

Parish said the workshop on banner finishing would aim to help printers bring more work in-house rather than outsourcing.

"You only need to invest in a few extra pieces of equipment, such as tape, elastic chords and display solutions and you won’t have to pay anyone else to do the work for you," she said.  

Cat Young, social media consultant and senior executive officer of STW Digital Media Agency, will hold a conference called Do it Yourself Digital Marketing. She will advise business owners on how to use social media such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to market companies on a budget.

Young will cover search engine optimisation (SEO) and how to bring in more visits to websites through search engines. She will also advise on how to use tools that administer email campaigns for free and demonstrate how to measure their online presence with free tools such as Google Analytics.

Young will hold 20 minute one-to-one consultations during the conference in which she will offer advice on how businesses can improve their social media strategies.