The acquisition, completed in October, has allowed Brand Imaging to significantly strengthen its platemaking operations, with Waldo able to take advantage of its new owner’s connections with end clients.

Brand co-founder and director Mark Bent told Printweek: “With our front-end tools and our studio, I think bringing the two together gives us quite a unique selling point [among] printers.

“Phil [Walmsley, ex-MD of Waldo] had all the technology, all the equipment, he's got all the ISO accreditations and everything. He's got really strong products at the backend. And we feel that when you marry that with what we've got, we've got a really really strong business now.”

Bent said he hopes for the brands, which turned over around £4m each last year, to turn over a combined £10m by 2024.

Walmsley had been looking, since the pandemic, for a way to pass on the role of leader at Waldo - having considered several potential bidders, he decided to sell to Brand Imaging.

He told Printweek: “Where I perceived the company needing to go, moving forward over the next 10-20 years, I honestly didn’t think I had the drive and desire to take up that journey and push it forward.”

Speaking to the team at Brand Imaging, he realised that their vision for Waldo - which he had always tried to keep at the forefront of technology - was aligned with his own, he said.

Walmsley added: “In flexible packaging and corrugated, the [number of] acquisitions has been massive over the last couple of years, and in our market, the actual printing. 

“So the cake has got smaller and smaller - so we said, look - we need to start communicating and dealing directly with brands. Well, we had no experience of that, and it was quite fortuitous that [Brand Imaging] rang.”

Waldo has retained its name and management in the merger, and the vast majority of its staff, according to Bent, meaning the combined business now has around 90 staff.

“It’s pretty much the same - we’re going through a period of consolidation in areas like accounts and things like that, but the overall picture is pretty static,” he said.

Waldo’s management team is a particularly exciting prospect, Bent said.

“The management team within Waldo in Louth is a young management team, really well skilled, and there’s some group roles being created between Manchester and Louth, so essentially the heartbeat of the business stays the same.”