The successful firms will produce marketing collateral, conservation guidance notes, archaeological reports and commercial material for the conservation watchdog.

Prior to the framework deal English Heritage print buyer Elaine Pooke said EH's nine UK regions used to contract work on an "everyone and anyone basis", which needed tighter structuring.

Wyndeham Press Group will produce web and sheet-fed work, including an events diary, and St Ives Web will produce 500,000 handbooks. Hawthornes in Nottingham and London's Vitesse will tackle sheet-fed work, as will Matthews. The Colourhouse in London is printing leaflets in a job worth over 200,000.

The tender process took over eight months to whittle the applicants down to six and the contracts are for three years with two-year extensions in the offing.

Pooke, who worked on the tender process with her head of marketing services Kate Linnell, said she would use an MIS to streamline jobs and eventually place orders online.

Story by Jez Abbott