"Before we were farming out 60-70% of our finishing because we did not have the equipment," said print finishing manager Nigel Willis.

To resolve the situation the Alton, Hampshire-based firm traded in its small-format MB folder and installed a four plate, two-knife Shoei Star combination folder from Encore Machinery.

It also added a four feeder plus cover Muller Martini Valore line with gatherer and three-knife trimmer, the firm's first stitching line.

Before the kit went in, the 15-staff B2 commercial printer, which specialises in high-quality brochures, was spending around 70,000 a year outsourcing its folding and stitching work.

"Arrowhead is a very dynamic firm and now there are only one or two specialist jobs we need to send out and only in areas where we don't have sufficient work to warrant investing in the equipment," said Willis.

Story by Darryl Danielli