Delivered in late October 2023, the press and cutting table were commissioned quickly – the Versant was operational on the day of delivery – and now make up Colour Print’s digital and short-run wing.
Both were purchased through supplier First Copy, with whom Colour Print has worked for many years; the Versant 280 was replacing a 180 model, also bought through First Copy.
Managing director Ric Martin told Printweek that the firm had decided to diversify to pursue changing customer demands.
“We saw an opportunity,” he said.
“Since Covid, a lot of people have started kitchen worktop businesses with a need for short-run packaging. That can be quite restrictive in terms of minimum order cost – so the Blade is ideal for getting products to market fairly quickly, and fairly inexpensively.”
With a Komori five-colour SRA2 press downstairs, Colour Print’s digital capabilities are able to complement more traditional work, where print volumes are contracting.
“We’ve been trying to diversify our services,” Martin added.
“We provide a lot of pick, pack and despatch for charities, to support the print work we were already doing for them, and the Blade and Xerox provide a nice short-run solution for brochures.”
The Blade is particularly useful, Martin said, for opening up the creative potential in many of Colour Print’s more standard products.
“It will cut apertures in the front covers of brochures; it’ll do really interesting pieces of direct mail; it’s very good for greetings cards: we see quite a broad range of areas where we think it will be valuable.
“The Blade is proving itself every few days, with each different request from a different customer – it’s going well.”
Martin said he was also particularly pleased with the Blade’s functionality: “It’s very accurate. You can put a sheet through, take it off, put it back on, and the laser alignment of the head is so accurate it will cut in exactly the same position every time. So long as you have the registration marks, it will be perfect. We like to think we’ve tested it to its maximum limits, and it has coped very well.”
Colour Print employs nine at its site in the north of Norwich.
