It is widely understood that Epson does not manufacture nor design any of the fine art papers or canvases (nor do any other large equipment manufacturers such as HP, Canon, Roland, etc.), including of course the Epson canvas discussed in this article. Inkjet fine art papers and canvas development is instead done by manufacturers with this specific core competency. From the inkjet canvas manufacturers, Epson selects a mainstream and veratile product to ultimately deliver what they call the Epson canvas to the marketplace. An emphasis should be placed on the word "versatile". A canvas that is optimally versatile must deliver solid quality when used on the Epson 11880, Epson 9800, Epson 7800, and Epson 4800, which utilize Ultrachome K3 inks through eight color ink technology. Generally, the widest range of Epson users should be pleased with the Epson Canvas, which includes individual amateur and professional photographers, artists, signage printing bureaus, and giclee printers. Mainstream Epson users wouldn't complain with the performance of the Epson Canvas. It also directly introduces owners of Epson printers to giclee reproduction onto inkjet canvas and the challenging world of retail-level fine art sales and marketing.

Nonetheless, there are small range of other giclee canvas manufacturers who's product development and marketing strategy differs quite drastically from that of Epson. Most of these inkjet canvas manufacturers target the different segments of fine art printing service bureaus with highly differentiated products that take advantage of the disadvantages of Epson canvas attributes and its price point. It is important to understand how and why this is the case.

Bureaucracy creates a issue for Epson because every fine art product is over-scrutinized by multiple departments before it ever reaches the market. A brand new product like the Epson canvas might reach the market anywhere from 6-12 months from the time it was initially developed. This significant setbackresults in a disadvantage for Epson because competitors have plenty of time to develop and release their own new inkjet canvas before Epson does and has a concrete advantage.

After the release of the Epson Canvas, one can expect Epson, or any other large OEM to, continue with the fine art canvas for several years prior to any consideration of releasing an an improvement to the fine art product. As illustrated above, developing new fine art canvas is a very intense and costly project and therefore Original Equipment Manufacturers much prefer to let the inkjet canvas run its life cycle. Regrettably this approach puts Epson at a disadvantage because competitors, who are more nimble and are laser-focused on the fine art inkjet canvas industry, can easily release products that provide objectively superior print quality. In the previous five to ten year span, several competing manufacturers have released products that go toe-to-toe with the Epson canvas and are commonly perceived to deliver fine printing quality. As a result, these competitors have captured a large portion of the professional photography and fine art market who tend to place a much higher value on superior quality.