Last month it completed a major upgrade of a Muller Martini Grapha web press, increasing the number of units from four to six to give more flexibility to the business.
The improved machine now matches the configuration of A1's other large press, an Imer 120BF. The upgrade gives improved contingency and doubles capacity for larger-than-usual orders.
The upgrade also included two new UV lamps on the new towers to maintain the interdeck UV drying system on the original press.
Production manager Ian Woodhouse said: “Any time we can avoid going through the press more than we have to allows us to reduce costs and increase capacity.”
A1 Security Print, which has 70 staff and a turnover of £7.2m, also bought a Xerox Versant 2100 to run alongside a Xerox 700 and produce work such as personalised booklets.
Marketing manager Michael Kelly said: “We wanted additional capacity for the Versant and improved efficiency for the Grapha. The investment amounted to £200,000.
“We originally bought to the new Xerox to replace the Xerox 700, but decided to keep this for additional capacity and backup. The Versant has already brought in £500,000 of new business.”
Kelly added: “The new investments give us more flexibility and make us more competitive. A lot of work we can now do in one pass instead of two and we are doing larger runs.”
Account manager Derrick Taylor said the upgrade made A1 Security Print more competitive for many types of work.
“We print numerous specialist inks for high-end security print work on top of the standard print colours, so we often have to put jobs through the press at least twice.
“We recently printed a job containing 17 colours, which would have required five passes on the Grapha. We could now run this job in just three passes on the upgraded press.
“This reduced costs, waste and lead times. For some of the larger jobs we produce in the millions, we can now run them across two presses at the same time, reducing turnaround time considerably.”
The Muller Martini Grapha upgrade earlier in April was followed up with the acquisition of the Xerox Versant 2100 with a booklet maker, squarefold trimmer and a Fiery FS100 Pro RIP.
Managing director Jim Richardson said: “The increasing demand for secure variable print production and the ever decreasing lead times in this sector necessitated a more robust digital press with greater performance. The Xerox Versant ticked all of the boxes.
“The additional capacity that the Versant created for variable data booklet production has already been filled, so we may be adding to our digital presses again in the near future.”
