Kevin Brennan, label division manager at MRP, explained that the firm was experiencing increased demand for labelling through existing clients and was therefore investing in new kit.

"The [new KDO press] lends itself, more than our other presses, to a particular kind of work," he told printweek.com. "Mainly price labels on paper without UV, which use existing tooling from our other two KDO presses."

MRP, which has an annual turnover of about £5m and employs a staff of about 50, is primarily a sheetfed offset printer; with labelling a sideline of the business.

"Probably in the last four or five years we've been trying to expand labelling and probably in the last two years we've quite considerably increased our output," Brennan added. "Hence the need for equipment to give us extra capacity."

The machine is a KDO 3 Series four-colour 265mm narrow web machine press, which is manufactured by K2 International. It has been in use at MRP for about a month. It produces self-adhesive labels for customers in the leisure and entertainment sectors.

The PLC touch-screen operated machine's features include ceramic anilox rolls with doctor blades, a fully automatic web tension control and rotary scissor slitting.

MRP also has a six-colour and a seven-colour narrow web press at its Basford facility. Both feature infrared drying and UV curing, enabling the firm to print a variety of labels.

Worcestershire-based K2 has recently won contracts to supply a number of flexo presses to customers in the UK, Scandinavia and India.