The department, which prints documents on a Konica Minolta Bizhub C5501, bought the machine to solve the problem of diminishing demand in conventional bindery products at the department.

Keele University bookbinding direct manager Mark Jukes said: "Until a couple years ago, up to half of our workload involved traditional bookbinding for libraries, but that was beginning to drop off.

"We could have retrenched, but we took the view that a prudent investment in more robust, technically advanced equipment would have the benefit of allowing us to process our established products more efficiently while taking on trade work that would provide us with an additional revenue stream."

He added: "Now, we can even produce longer of runs of up to a couple of thousand for the trade, so it has worked out really well for us. And the new online venture is perfectly pitched to capitalise on a growth market that we expect to be contributing more than a third of our turnover next year."