It is also considering options for a new laminator.

The new press replaces a slightly slower NexPress model, the ZX3300, itself only 18 months old. The company decided to upgrade to the ZX3900 because it has a long sheet feeder and can produce A4 landscape books, which the other model couldn’t. It is also marginally faster, able to process 3,900sph A4.

The NexPress can handle paper stocks up to 350-400gsm to a size of 356x1,000mm.

The family-run business was born out of Forward Press in 2010. Forward Press was set up in 1994 by Ian and Tracey Walton and put into voluntary liquidation in 2010. Nowadays the Bonacia business is run by the Waltons’ daughters, Rosie and Morgan.

There are several strands to the £4m Bonacia business; the biggest is Book Printing UK, which specialises in short- and long-run digital printing.

Morgan Walton said the enterprise was growing fast and there was particular demand from customers for A4 landscape books. “We’re upgrading to this new press pretty quickly but that’s because we’re expanding massively,” she said. In 2015 turnover was £3.2m, last year it came close to £4m.

The 80-employee business prints around 80,000 books a month, from training manuals to glossy hardcover coffee-table books, and a variety of stitched and coiled hardbacks and softbacks. It also produces magazines, posters, flyers and a variety of digital print products.

As well as the NexPress, the Cambridgeshire plant has two mono Xerox machines, a Nuvera 314 and 157. There is also a wide-format, 42in HP DesignJet Z6200 and a full complement of finishing and binding kit.

Walton said the business was constantly on the lookout for new equipment to speed up its production and increase capacity. The next capital purchase is likely to be a laminator.

She said: “We haven't made a decision on the laminator just yet but have been looking at the Foliant and plan to attend an IFS open house event next month.”