Hendersons Belfast Go-Large

Henderson Print, located in Belfast, has invested in a wide format Agfa Anapurna H2500i LED press taking them into “a new and more profitable market for the business”, according to Head of Print for the company, Alan Ritchie.

The business started as the print department for the highly successful, £800m turnover Henderson Group**. They appointed Alan Ritchie 34 years ago to expand the print business by attracting work from outside the group. Today, with an annual turnover of more than £3m, over half of which is work obtained outside the Henderson Group of companies, Henderson Print has invested in this new hybrid machine to grow the wide format division of their business.

Henderson Print is an established litho print provider that has been located on its current site in Michelin Road since the acquisition of Dargan Press two and half years ago. They now have 29 employees and run two B2 five-colour presses and a B2 two-colour press. They already have four Roland roll-to-roll wide format printers and this latest investment adds a Kongsberg plotter cutter machine working alongside the Agfa Anapurna H2500i LED digital wide-format press run by the Agfa Asanti workflow solution.

The company did have the advantage of knowing that the wide format business they could pitch for from the group alone was financial justification enough for a new Agfa Anapurna. Albeit that they have to compete for sister company business on price, just like any other provider. They purchased the new Agfa kit through their print supplier GPMI*, with whom they’ve had a long working relationship.

“WE WERE BLOWN AWAY WITH THE DEMO PROVIDED BY GPMI. IT REALLY SOLD THE AGFA ENGINE TO US.”

“We were looking for a flat bed wide format printing solution so we could print on rigid substrates. We visited the Sign and Display exhibition at the NEC in Birmingham to assess the options last year.” Said Alan Ritchie. “On our return we were given a demonstration on an Agfa Anapurna by Alan O’Brien, Director of Technology at GPMI. We were simply blown away by the demo in their Dublin showroom. Everything ran perfectly, and we were really impressed by the quality of the print. Agfa has a great reputation for product innovation and quality in the industry. That, coupled with the fact that Peter Doyle from Agfa is very responsive to our needs and of course an attractive price and service contract, meant that David Brennan at GPMI quickly closed the deal.”

The installation of the Agfa Anapurna H2500i LED went smoothly and to date Henderson Print has had very little down time on the kit. They insisted on having Alan O’Brien from GPMI carry out the training as they highly rate his technical ability and the production employees within Henderson Print know him well.

The Anapurna H2500i LED printer is a high-speed hybrid UV LED-curable inkjet press with a printing width of 2.5m for indoor and outdoor applications. It has been designed to use minimal ink, using Agfa’s ‘Thin Ink Layer Technology’, helping to keep the cost of consumables down and offering an environmental advantage too. The LED-curable lamps also use less power and reduce set-up time by not having to wait for bulbs to warm up.

The Agfa Asanti workflow is a complete, automated sign and display production hub featuring a colour management solution, integration with the latest version of Adobe PDF Print Engine (APPE), highly specific functionalities (e.g. nesting, see-through concept, proofing support) and fast, automatic pre-flighting. It will streamline Henderson’s workflow simplifying their processes.

“WE ARE SUPER IMPRESSED WITH THE SHARPNESS, DEFINITION AND COLOUR STRENGTH.”

“We see a lot of our future expansion coming from the digital wide format side of our business.” Concluded Alan Ritchie. There will always be a market for litho, but I don’t see it growing at the rate we require and the investment size for a new litho press would be upwards of £1.5m. The wide format market is financially easier to access, and the market opportunity is there. The Anapurna quality is superb, even our customers are blown away with the sharpness, definition and colour strength of image. We are super impressed. It also allows us to get creative in what we offer. It’s great for small print runs which can be personalized to gives us a point of difference to sell in the future.”

Groundbreaking, Super-Fast Technology for Business Success

Massivit 3D offers a portfolio of versatile large format 3D printers for visual communication. Both the Massivit 1800 Flagship 3D Printer and the Massivit 1500 Exploration 3D Printers are geared towards a range of innovative advertising, retailing, entertainment, and interior design applications and enable rapid turnaround for campaigns and projects.
Come to our Open House on 17/18 October and learn more from Massivit’s Sales Director Nir Dvir.

Print Show 2018

GPMI Reprocentre will be attending Print Show in Birmingham this year.
This event is getting bigger every year, with more and more of the bigger manufactures exhibiting, if its not on your radar,
now it is, if your attending, we would love to meet you at some point over the few days.
For more information contact Eoin on +353 87 2505765 or email eoin.honan@gpmi.ie

Trade announcement

August 21st, 2018

Dear Customer/Supplier

Allied Graphics and Equipment to become part of GPMI.

We are pleased to announce that Graphic & Paper Merchant Holdings LTD (GPMI) has signed an agreement to acquire Allied Graphics and Equipment (NI) Limited with completion expected from September 3rd 2018.

Allied Graphics established in 1984 is a successful family run business, supplying pre-press and finishing solutions from leading manufacturers. In April 2000 they purchased Walter Nash Belfast, adding to their already strong portfolio of finishing and press room products. The company trades on a strong customer service philosophy which is highly complementary to the GPMI business in Northern Ireland. Allied will bring new products to our portfolio, allowing us to expand further our offering to our customer base.

As a valued customer we are available for any questions you might have (email below). Thank you for your custom and we look forward to continuing to provide you with the best customer service in the industry.

simon@alliedgraphics.co.uk
eoin.honan@gpmi.ie
sonny.vance@gpmi.co.uk

Please click here for full pdf.

New Watkiss booklet maker has wider range of applications for digital printers

PRESS RELEASE – Sandy, UK .  31st July July 2018.

New Watkiss booklet maker has wider range of applications for digital printers

Watkiss Automation Ltd announces the launch of a new booklet maker in the PowerSquare range.  The PSQ160-WH is a hand-feed booklet maker for short run work, designed for flexible applications in a wide range of media sizes including long sheets and larger formats that existing options on the market.

As more digital presses from companies such as Canon, Konica Minolta, Ricoh and Xerox can print duplex on long sheets, there is a growing demand for A4 landscape and other large format booklets.

Paul Attew, sales director at Watkiss explains “The hand-feed PSQ160-WH is ideal for this type of application.  It is a very practical solution for low volume digital printed jobs, where ease of set-up and flexible media sizes are important – and where you can be confident that book quality is never compromised”.

The PSQ160-WH is an ‘all-in-one’ booklet maker that also includes face trimming and square spine forming integral to the machine.  As such, it has a small footprint meaning it will easily fit into any print environment.

It produces SquareBack™ books that lie flat, stack easily and allow printing on the spine.  Superior book quality is a feature of all PowerSquare booklet makers.  The system uses in-process spine forming and automatic adjustment for book thickness, with auto folder mode, to optimise performance quality on thin and thick booklets.

For ease of use, it has fully automatic setup using a tile-based user interface with touch and swipe functionality which will be familiar and intuitive to all smart phone users.  It includes pre-set standard sizes and the ability to store custom job sizes.

The wide media range process input sizes from 200 x 200mm to 370 x 620mm; with stock weights from 60 to 400gsm.  Finished booklet sizes can range from 120 x 78mm to 370 x 305mm, and so encompass all popular booklet applications such as A4 landscape, 12 x 12 inches, DL size (99 x 210mm) and CD booklets, which can all be completed in a single pass.

The PSQ160-WH uses a zero-maintenance low impact stapling mechanism with moving clinches for flat, well-formed staples over the full range from 2 to 40 sheets.  The adjustable staple pitch ensures the best staple position to suit the book size and extra high tensile staples ensure reliable performance on coated and thick papers.

The PSQ160-WH can also be fitted with the optional P2T Side Trimmer that trims the top and bottom of the book for full-bleed colour applications.

It is ideal for short run manuals, magazines, programmes, academic journals, financial reports and education materials.

The PSQ160-WH is available immediately, and will be on show for the first time at The Print Show at the NEC in September.

Trade announcement – GPMI aquires ESSENTRA/SWIFTBROOK

Dear Customer/Supplier

Swiftbrook to become part of GPMI, but business as usual

We are pleased to inform you that Graphic and Paper Merchants Holdings Limited (“GPMI”) has signed an agreement to acquire the Swiftbook business from Essentra Packaging Ireland Limited, with completion of the transaction expected before end-O3 2018.

Swiftbrook is highly complementary to GPMl’s activities in Ireland, sharing a focus on providing customers with value-added solutions through the use of technologies, systems and production capabilities.

 

Business as usual

We would like to stress that right now for all our customers and suppliers it is “business as usual”, with Essentra continuing to manage the business until completion of the acquisition.
As a valued customer, we shall continue to remain in contact with you providing a comprehensive update on the proposed developments for our business. Should you have any initial questions, please do not hesitate to contact me at WarrenBrennan@essentra.com or your sales representative.

For your interest, further information on GPMI can be found at www.gpmi.ie

 

Full PDF can be found here

New features and major improvements boost production efficiency with new Apogee v11

A solid workflow adapted to changing market requirements is a high-value asset for printers. Building on its unique feature set as production hub, Apogee v11 takes print production to the next level by automating all prepress tasks. The new release also includes multi-product support to increase printing efficiency, while the integration with PressTune supports Agfa Graphics’ ECO³ market approach focused on economy, ecology and extra convenience.
Press efficiency and order combination

Apogee v11 offers a mechanism to combine print jobs in an intelligent way in order to optimize press time, while also keeping track of the actual order. With this new feature, it caters to the needs of printers faced with shortening run lengths and looking for ways to keep their presses running as efficiently as possible to maintain sustainable margins.

The challenge of combining orders on a single press sheet does not lie in the actual placement of the various orders, but in keeping track of the separate orders and allowing for proper finishing. With Apogee v11, collation marks, signature barcodes and all other marks remain in place and refer to the original order.

“This is a major step forward in production efficiency,” says Erik Peeters, Global Marketing Manager Software Solutions. “Combining orders reduces plate changes and lowers production costs. As paper waste is significantly less, the ecological footprint decreases too. As always, Apogee looks beyond pure functionalities and takes the full production cycle into account.”
Production hub

In addition, Apogee v11 functions as the ideal production hub, guaranteeing reliable content reproduction independent of output devices, including digital presses. As such, it allows printers to increase their production efficiency and tackle the squeezed margins on low copy count orders.

Apogee v11 handles all necessary preparations, including specific production requirements like cut ‘n stack, or booklet printing. To reduce the manual job preparation even more, orders can be processed in a fully automatic way using AutoImpose, a new function of the award-winning Apogee Impose. This simplifies the workflow and reduces production costs as digital press operators now only need to manage and control devices and output quality.

“The automatic imposition feature in Apogee v11 is a key feature for digital print production,” says Erik Peeters. “Combined with Agfa’s cloud-based automation solution, PrintSphere AutoPilot, which uses XML or JDF information to intelligently route orders to the appropriate output device, it becomes a very powerful tool to increase the overall efficiency of a printing company.”
Print buyers get greater control

Apogee WebApproval, the online portal that lets print buyers access their jobs for file upload and page approval, also gets an update. Firstly, printers can now allow their customers to create new jobs directly, limiting the workload of prepress operators for repeat jobs. Secondly, the new ‘Guest’ function makes it easier for print service providers to offer the easy-to-use WebApproval service to print brokers and one-time users. Thirdly, users can now also preview foldouts and check the size and position of layout elements.
Easy online access to production data

Apogee WebFlow is a new module that gives customer service representatives, press and finishing operators or others within a printing company access to prepress job data. It makes it easy to check job status, visualize page content and check which signatures are ready for output. WebFlow exchanges job info with Agfa Graphics’ ECO3 software solution PressTune, enabling CSRs to quickly review the print quality of their customers’ orders and as such avoid the cost of re-runs due to print quality rejection by the print buyer.
“Whether you are on the road or sitting in your couch with a tablet, you can track jobs anytime, anywhere,” Erik Peeters states. “We keep extending our family of web tools while at the same time listening to our users who insist on keeping things simple for their customers.”

Geared towards the future

Innovation is the driving force within Agfa. More than 20 years ago, Apogee Series 1 was the first workflow to use PDF as a production file format. The newest generation of Apogee continues to take the lead in prepress workflow solutions, which is also why the latest technologies from key partners Microsoft and Adobe are integrated. Apogee v11 includes the Adobe PDF Print Engine 5 to prepare printers for full compatibility with the new PDF 2.0 standard and to output designs correctly.

“After Adobe launched PDF and Acrobat twenty-five years ago, Agfa followed with the first prepress solution to use the new PDF file format for print workflow,” said Mark Lewiecki, Senior Product Manager, Adobe. “Today’s release of Apogee 11 builds on this long-standing relationship by taking advantage of Adobe PDF Print Engine version 5. Agfa customers will benefit from greater workflow efficiencies, powerful new color capabilities, and full support of PDF 2.0 print features.”

Version 11 from Apogee will be available from 22 October 2018 onward. It will be offered both as on-premise and cloud solution. The on-premise version will also be available via a subscription model for customers who want to transition easily to this powerful prepress workflow solution.

GPMI’s last vehicle wrap workshop of the year.

Thanks to all customers who attended the training in 2017. Using Avery’s premium cast materials – MPI 1104 Easy Apply & Supreme Wrapping Films saves you time & money while offering your clients a great finished product.
Need SWF colours by the metre?
GPMI is the best solution to source these materials for your business!!

Please advise of your interest for training in 2018.

MB Car stickers purchase a Mimaki CJV30-130

A big thanks to Mantas Barsteiga of MB Car stickers, for his recent purchase of a Mimaki CJV30-130, and of course the Avery Supreme Wrapping film SW900 product, which he used to wrap a lovely Mercedes Benz to take 3rd prize at a recent car show event at North East Modified. Mantas attends to do the Canonball Run ( cannonball.ie ) in September where he would like to drum up some car wrapping business, we wish him all the best, I think he will do very well considering the quality of the work he produces… contact MB Stickers at carstickerjob@gmail.com he is based in Ballymount Drive, Walkinstown.

Superb Building Façade by Signs Connect Ireland

Superb Building Façade makeover done by Patrick Lennon in Signs Connect Ireland. The Film used was (for the first time ever in Ireland) Avery Facade film, with a bespoke colour match to Hilti Irelands corporate colour in a matt finish to completely change the Facade of their HQ building in Dublin. The Film was Supplied and supported by GPMI.