Both former Babs agencies will now be distributed by Duplo after the rights were signed over by the respective manufacturers last week.

"We've been eyeing Ideal for around 15 years," said Duplo's marketing manager Peter Jolly. "But we thought our chance had passed. Guillotines weren't necessarily our strongest aspect."

Duplo will phase out its current range of PFI Guillotines. Shredders are a totally new product for the firm.

Previously, Eurofold (a brand belonging to Swiss firm Multigraf) was a competitor, but Duplo distributed Mutligraph's Foldmaster. Now it sells all Multigraph folders. Multigraph also distributes Duplo products in Switzerland. 

Wolfgang Priester, president of Ideal's manufacturer Krug & Priester said: "We signed the rights to Duplo International because the company has a proven track record in the UK."

Duplo is also said to be looking forward to working with Babs' Ideal clients, such as the BBC, on its other products and ranges.

All of Babs' maintenance agreements are now to be handled by Loughton-based PFE International.