The new press will be the first step in refreshing the company’s triple litho press lineup, replacing a 15-year-old Heidelberg CD-series press, with total investment – including a reconstructed press plinth – coming to £3.5m.
Mike Lammas, Herbert Walkers' managing director, told Printweek that his team were thrilled to be getting their hands on the new machine.
“The guys are fighting to be the ones that get to run it,” he said.
“We believe it will make our factory up there with the best of them, certainly for a privately owned business.
“After Covid, we realised we needed to put in a new press to stay ahead of the curve on technology. We came very close to ordering the press then – but realised that any new press would be super-productive, increase the number of sheets we could print, and made us concerned that our post-press processes would struggle to keep up. There’s no point in having a printer that puts more sheets out if you can’t deal with them at post-press.”
In 2021, therefore, the firm invested £3m in finishing kit, including Bobst Visionfoil, Bobst Novacut, and Signature folder-gluer, taking the firm to a total of four B1 foiling machines, three B1 die-cutters, three gluing lines, and window patching machinery
“We pride ourselves on having everything under one roof, so nothing needs to leave,” Lammas explained.
With the raft of new post-press equipment in place, “the time was right,” Lammas said.
After studying all the major players in the marketplace, the team landed on Heidelberg’s XL 106 as a good fit for the company’s applications, largely hi-spec food packaging, cosmetics, and greetings cards, and for its fit with the company’s two other Speedmaster XL presses.
The two other presses – also around 15 years old – may soon come up for replacement, if all goes well, Lammas said.
“We’ll get this press in, and see how it performs. If it does as well as we hope it will, and as well as we’re told it will, then a second machine could be in the offing in the not-too-distant future,” he said.
“But we will need to see how the market goes: obviously, all businesses are under a fair bit of pressure at the moment.
“In fact, that was one of the issues over the past two or three years: it was never the right time [to bring in a new press]: it was either Covid, the energy crisis and Ukraine war, or a change in government – we felt we’d waited long enough.”
Lammas added that while 2023 had been a challenging year, 2024 had been stronger with “green shoots” of growth, despite industry-wide nervousness around issues like the National Insurance rise.
“But that’s going to be the same for everyone,” he added.
Notwithstanding, Herbert Walkers has several projects under wraps for 2025.
“I can’t go into it – but we’re excited about where this press can lead us,” he said.
Herbert Walkers employs 110 staff, turning over around £15m annually.
