Packaging

Elixir, Bucharest: From Sheet-Fed to Web Offset Printing

Monday 01. April 2013 - With the new Concepta web offset printing press from Muller Martini, Elixir Press in the Romanian capital Bucharest can kill three birds with one stone: The company can switch from sheet-fed offset printing of its crossword magazines to web offset printing, capture new market segments, and strengthen its position as a partner to external companies.

Solving crosswords is a popular pastime in Romania. Before the change of regime in 1989 there was just a single, state-owned crossword magazine, but their number has grown rapidly in the past two decades. Elixir Press alone, in addition to 40 other titles, publishes eight illustrated crossword magazines of varying degrees of difficulty. Their print runs have been stable for years and range between 20,000 and 50,000 copies depending on the title.
Previously these magazines, which are stitched on a Presto from Muller Martini or perfect bound using a Pantera also from Muller Martini (see box), were printed using sheet-fed offset technology. Now, however, Vasile Tirsolea, who founded the company in 1994, is switching to web offset printing. He gave several reasons for that: “I’m counting on a quicker and more cost-effective printing process that will significantly increase print quality. Web offset gives us much more versatility in terms of paper weight. That is particularly important to us because we use very thin paper for the crossword magazines.”
A New Concepta in a New Hall
Elixir Press therefore installed a Concepta web offset printing press with four ink fountains, a QS 74 cross cutter and a Unistack 3000 stacker last spring after successful tests at the Muller Martini Training Center Presses in Maulburg, Germany. A new, spacious production facility was set up in the industrial zone of Bucharest for that purpose.
Company director Tirsolea decided in favor of the Concepta for two main reasons: “First, we have been partners with Muller Martini for a long time in the field of print finishing. Second, I attended Muller Martini’s open house last year in the Czech city of Opava and was convinced by the wide-ranging possibilities offered by the Concepta.”
The business plan of the full-service company includes not only the switch from sheet-fed offset printing of crossword magazines to web offset printing, but also the acquisition of new customers in new market segments. “With the Concepta we can also focus on security printing, labels and pharmaceutical inserts in the future,” said Tirsolea.
It is the declared objective of the ambitious company, which presently has around 100 employees, to increase its volume of contract work. “Currently we are predominantly producing the titles of our own publishing company,” explained Tirsolea. “However, we aim to change that, because the new Concepta has made us significantly more attractive as partners to other publishers.”
The Country Needs New Ideas
According to Tirsolea, it makes sense that Elixir Press has invested in a new hall and modern and production machinery precisely in an economically difficult period. “During a crisis it’s particularly important to search for new ideas and make print products more attractive.”
The innovative businessman is therefore planning to finish his magazines with gimmicks, stickers, inserts and scratch cards and to film-wrap them. To that end, Elixir Press commissioned an Onyx/Rubin inserting and film-wrapping line from Muller Martini a few months before the Concepta.
When saddle stitched products are perfect bound
Elixir Press has come up with an innovative way of bringing unsold crossword magazines (back) onto the market. Three saddle stitched magazines are gathered, given a cover, perfect bound and then sold at a discount price at kiosks as an omnibus edition. For such special and other softcover products, Elixir Press uses a Pantera perfect binder from Muller Martini as well as a stand-alone gathering machine with a criss-cross delivery.
Elixir purchased the gathering machine, the Pantera and all other printing presses and print finishing machines brand-new from the factories of the manufacturers. “I always want to have the latest systems, which is why secondhand machines don’t fit in our concept,” emphasized Tirsolea.