The press, which is due to be installed at the firm’s Taunton plant next week, has replaced a Speedmaster SM 102-8-P and SM 74-5, both of which will be sold on. The total cost of the investment, which also included an Esko Kongsberg XL cutter, was around £1.5m.
“The CX 102 has fast makereadies to render us competitive on very short-run work. It will also give us the ability to run a very wide range of paper and board substrates plus high up-time to enable us to provide consistent service levels to the business,” said director of print operations Chris Tester.
The firm also looked closely at Komori presses with H-UV but opted for the CX 102 because of the Inpress Control feature, which will give the firm greater quality control, and Heidelberg’s overall service, parts supply and support package.
The company, which holds ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 certifications, expects to reduce its waste paper costs by around £80,000 per year with the CX 102.
The inline coater will provide Magenta the opportunity for a wide range of finishes, such as high gloss and ‘drip off’, and faster turnarounds as work can be processed immediately after coming off the press.
“The CX 102 will give us the ability to print on a wide range of stocks. For some POS applications where we currently print on a digital flatbed, litho printing directly onto 1,000-micron board will now become a possibility, which will reduce our requirement for mounting,” said Tester.
The business also runs two 3.2m-wide Durst printers, a Rho P10 320R and Rho 320 HS, an Inca Onset S20 and small-format Xerox and Konica Minolta Digital kit. Earlier this year it brought all of its product labelling in-house after buying a Xerox iGen150 and Nuvera 157.
Magenta, which employs 88 staff at its 5,600sqm facility and has a turnover of around £13m, produces reports, instore POS material, short-run press packs and a range of marketing literature for Debenhams’ 172 UK stores. It outsources the retailer's direct mail requirements to the trade.
The firm also works with a number of third-party customers, primarily businesses affiliated with Debenhams including suppliers in the cosmetics and fragrance sector.
It uses its own print-on-demand system developed in-house and is able to get promotions in-store within 48 hours. Its average run length is 3,000 but it can vary from 150 sheets up to 250,000. The Debenhams Annual Report will be one of the first jobs to be printed on the new press.
