Finishing & Screen Printing
MORTONS GIVES THUMBS UP TO XTRAWIN FROM WRH MARKETING UK
Friday 14. November 2008 - Mortons Print, a division of Mortons of Horncastle in Lincolnshire, has given the thumbs up to the XtraWin business initiative from WRH Marketing UK Ltd following the highly successful commissioning earlier this year of additional Ferag equipment.
The aim of XtraWin is to help newspaper printers enter new sectors, such as the semi commercial market, and make better use of reserve press capacity. The new facilities at Mortons Print have provided it with much greater press, folder and mailroom flexibility. As well as the Ferag equipment the company has fitted its six-tower Uniset with an additional manroland folder.
“Ferag installed the new MultiStack bundle stackers, accumulation bundle conveyors, SmartStrap and StreamStitch systems to fit in with our schedule, so that we did not lose any productivity,” says Ian Fisher, managing director of Mortons Print. “These have since made a significant improvement to our ability to handle a wide range of post-press functions more cost effectively, while providing customers with a faster turnaround.
“The full potential of a newspaper press is often not achieved because of limitations within the post-press area. Previously, if a job did not require all six Uniset towers, then those not used were effectively wasted for the duration of that production run. We already operated off-line stitching facilities and had a RollSert inserting unit, plus Ferag stacking, conveying and trimming systems, which enabled the production of tabloid and quarter fold work incorporating a variety of inserts.
“The additional Ferag equipment has given us huge press flexibility, allowing us to utilise the majority of towers for most of the time. For example, we could print a job requiring four towers, then quarter fold and stitch it on-line using the new StreamStitch facility, while at the same time producing a completely different job on the remaining two towers, with the output from these being handled off-line by the existing Ferag equipment. The tower combinations could be one and five or three and three, while the stock, run lengths and finishing could be totally different for each job.”
Mortons Print uses its coldset manroland Uniset virtually entirely for contract printing, producing more than 200 newspapers and lifestyle publications for customers throughout the UK. Products include quarter fold publications, which can be heatset and coldset with self cover/glossy cover, and tabloid work, which can be heatset and coldset with a glossy cover. Run lengths are normally between 1,000 and 1,000,000.
“Mortons grew during 2007 by around 12% and during the last year we have taken on around fifty new customers. Virtually all of this new work requires post-press operations and the XtraWin facilities have allowed us to accommodate this work much more efficiently and therefore more competitively. A lot of these new customers operate in the specialist newspaper and ethnic publishing sector. However, weve also won clients as far away as France.
“XtraWin has enabled us to offer added value options to customers that were previously prohibited by constraints of volume and lead times,” says Ian Fisher. “A high percentage of new work is handled on-line, while around half of all our customers require products with some element of stitching and trimming. The efficiencies of on-line operation cannot be overestimated in terms of staffing resource, material handling and lead times.
“For a relatively low cost we created what is effectively a second comprehensive mailroom facility without having to duplicate the equipment, and we have achieved this within the present factory space,” says Ian Fisher. “As part of Mortons continuing investment programme, the concept of XtraWin has proved to be an exceptionally good fit with our on-going strategy. This in turn has reflected and served the changing needs of our customers, who are equally challenged not only with differentiating but also with sustaining themselves in an increasingly media rich environment.
“The choices presented to the contract printer by the polarisation of a commoditised coldset market, set against opportunities within added value niche sectors, have never been starker. Given this situation, we are confident that our investment in XtraWin and our partnership with WRH Marketing UK will be a successful one.”
Marcus Evans is managing director at WRH Marketing UK Ltd: “The innovation shown by Mortons of Horncastle in adopting the XtraWin business concept from WRH Marketing illustrates how added-value in the mailroom will become a revenue stream for customers who have implemented Ferag technology.”