After visiting 45 countries and installing countless machines, Heaford will now be free to pursue a range of creative hobbies, including gardening and DIY, and will be able to spend more time with his family, including his grandchildren.

Founded by John Heaford in 1982, international pre-press and proofing machine supplier JM Heaford was literally a father-son affair, with the younger Heaford joining his father in a small industrial unit.

John Heaford had managed to get the money to rent the unit by modifying a GMS gravure proofing press to his own design and selling it; receiving several more orders, he opened the workshop and took on his son Nigel as a mechanical engineering apprentice, alongside a machine tool fitter, Pete Starkey, who trained him.

Nigel Heaford remembered: “We used to work long hours, from quarter to eight in the morning and didn’t finish until seven at night. On Friday we finished at five, and then worked Saturday and Sunday mornings – that went on for 12 years.

“My dad, John, always maintained that the worst thing he’d ever had to do during his work life [prior to JM Heaford] was make someone redundant through no fault of their own, because the business couldn’t support him.

“So we’d always run the business so that if things went tight, or orders were slow, he didn’t have to let people go. So those first 12 years had long hours, but it gave us a solid foundation.”

That solid foundation paid off for the young Heaford, too, even if it took hard work to build it.

“He was demanding to work for – he wasn’t going to jeopardise anyone’s jobs by nepotism, and Pete was about 32, with two young children. We always worked to our level,” Heaford said.

Before long, however, Heaford was qualified, with plenty of experience under his belt: by age 19, he was making solo deliveries and installations as far away as France.

“Pete was an excellent fitter, and taught me right. The industry was developing massively, too, and it was just so exciting being involved in it, and seeing those changes come in,” he said.

While Heaford started as a gravure proofing press manufacturer, by 1985 it had developed a flexo proofing press; the next year, it had progressed to using magnified lenses for registration, where the market was firmly stuck on mirror or pin-bar mounting of plates.

In 1992, a man called James River came to the business, and suggested using video cameras rather than lenses to mount the plates – and the business built the first micro-dot mounter.

“We sent invitations out to our contacts in the UK to come and see this new idea,” Heaford said.

“And after years of asking people in the flexo industry whether there was anything they needed to help their plate mounting, and them saying: ‘No, thank you, our pin-bar mounters, our mirror mounters, are great – we have great guys,’ – virtually every single company turned up to see this new idea.

“That launched our business into a new sphere.”

Heaford himself moved into sales in 1991, so got to see this explosion first-hand. Moving into export sales in 1993, he begun travelling all around the world to sell, install, and service machinery, relying on his long experience with the machines.

“I’ve worked on every continent; we’re lucky enough to have a good name in the industry, and it spread across the world,” he said.

“I’ve enjoyed everywhere I go – I’ve always made a point of getting out of the hotel and seeing the places I visit. There’s good people everywhere.”

His travels have taken him even to rather more unusual locations, like Iran – “A long time ago!” – and Bangkok during the red/yellow shirt riots.

“You hear about these places and see them, but when you get there they’re nothing like what you see on the news. We could be sitting in a cafe, drinking a coffee, and watch the riots up the road. You get a completely different picture when you’re actually there.”

With the business led by managing director David Muncaster since 2021, Heaford is happy to wind down.

“I’ve got grandchildren, I’ve got hobbies, and I just felt it was a good time to move over and let other people run [the business] without an old codger in the background,” he joked.