Butler & Tanner (B&T) has beefed up its digital capacity with the installation of a Heidelberg Digimaster 9110 and a Xerox DocuColor 2060, while a NexPress is due to arrive at one of the groups sites within a month.

The mono cut-sheet Digimaster and the colour cut-sheet DocuColor have been installed at the groups Selwood Printing site at Burgess Hill, where they join two IBM Infoprint mono webs and an existing DocuColor. The NexPress will be installed at Radstock Repro in Midsomer Norton.

Selwood is now a 100% digital facility its last remaining litho machine, a two-colour Speedmaster, has been relocated to Lawrence Allen in Weston-Super-Mare.

B&T marketing director Tim Taylor said both Selwood and Radstock would use the digital presses to serve their local markets "but where there are big jobs they can be split". The NexPress will also be used for publishers proofs.

Communication between the various machines was not a problem, Taylor said, as B&T employs the same PDF workflow throughout the group.

"Weve always treated manufacturing separately to file creation," said Taylor. "Weve striven to arrive at a neutral file format. PDF drives all our machines, including our KBAs."

Taylor said B&T had opted for the second DocuColor on the strength of its print quality. "It is absolutely fantastic," he said. "Although the NexPress is unproven weve been very impressed with what weve seen, particularly the build quality."

The push into digital was further evidence of B&Ts expansion beyond its traditional market of colour books, added Taylor.

B&T, which has sales of 50m, has also been making headway in the report and accounts market. It secured the Shell annual report contract just before Christmas.

Story by Lauretta Roberts