Although the company had advertised for a number of positions at a start-up site in Burton-upon-Trent, a spokeswoman told PrintWeek that it was not proceeding with the process.

“We are always looking at how we can best serve our customers as we continue to grow in the UK and throughout Europe. We had considered opening a new UK facility and did some preparatory work on it, including some exploration of local talent,” she said.

“We recently decided not to go forward with the project as we concluded that our current production facilities are well positioned to continue serving our UK customers. As a result, we do not intend to open a new UK plant at this time.”

Cimpress has a UK production site at Tradeprint in Dundee, along with a number of operations on the continent including its original supersite in Venlo in the Netherlands.

The news has been greeted with relief by existing bosses in the hyper-competitive UK web-to-print space.

“This is great news!” said the lead director at one operation.

A major tranche of investment has taken place or is already underway in the space: Belfast-headquartered Quinnstheprinters.com is setting up a new site in Runcorn; Route One has moved to a new 9,290sqm site in Rotherham and invested more than £5m last year; Falkland Press in Letchworth, owner of the PrintedEasy.com brand, has just gone B1 with a multimillion pound spend on new print and finishing kit; and Precision Printing will expand its London operations into new 5,110sqm premises later this year.