The consultation began today (January 4) at the 300-staff plant in Heybridge, Essex.

Employees in the press room, bindery, engineering, stores and line management departments are affected.

Wyndeham Group chief executive Paul Utting told PrintWeek that the decision was made, in part, because of the fire that hit the plant in July last year.

He said: "We haven't been using the Lithoman that suffered a fire last year and that has meant some over-staffing in the press room. It is then a case of balancing the rest of the business to the press capacity.

"Since the restructuring programme we implemented at Wyndeham Heron in 2008, the UK economy has continued to deteriorate and the company’s operating margins have suffered as a result.

"In addition, whilst market prices have increased marginally in the past year this has not been sufficient to offset the significant increases in raw materials and rising utility costs. These factors have had a significant negative impact on the financial performance of the business."

Utting stated that there were no further plans to make redundancies across the company at this point in time; however, he added: "It is down to what happens in the market. It is difficult to predict, but what we do know is that it will be tough for the economy."