The refurbished Presstek 34DI was installed at the new 370sqm site in Erith at the end of August, replacing an eight-year-old 34DI that had reached the end of its life. The investment breaks down as roughly £50,000 for the new site, including dilapidation fees on the old unit, and £27,000 for the Presstek including trade-in. 

Founder and managing director Brian Wilton said the newer Presstek would enable the seven-staff outfit to take on more jobs as it has improved quality, offers stochastic screening and takes 400gsm board weight, compared to 350gsm for the previous machine.

“We had an older one and it was showing its age a bit so as we were moving to a larger premises we thought at the same time we would upgrade to a newer one, and Presstek persuaded us to take on this updated one, which is a lot better and makes the whole process a lot quicker,” said Wilton.

“We can turn jobs around quicker and take more per day. The machine doesn’t run any quicker, but it’s a lot more reliable; we can set up the colour and get a sellable sheet a lot quicker.”

Running at up to 7,000sph, the four-colour SRA3 Presstek takes sheets ranging from 0.06mm to 0.5mm at a maximum size of 340x460mm and prints at a maximum resolution of 2,540dpi.

The move to the new site, which is more than three times the size of its previous home, comes at a time of growth for family-owned Greycot, after it took on the customer base, two staff and a single-colour Heidelberg GTO machine from Belvedere-based GT Print last November, when its owners John Garrod and Jeff Tomlin went into retirement, which then sparked the need for £500,000-turnover Greycot to upgrade premises.

Founded by Wilton and his wife Valerie Wilton in 1985, Greycot mainly produces print work for London hotels, cloakroom tickets and local councils.  It also runs a Xerox C75 production printer, which it is likely to double up on over the next year, along with a raft of finishing kit.