Paul Coggins, managing director, Print Finance "My advice would be to look very hard at the capability of your business. The fact many people haven’t invested for the last two to three years means companies are spending more money on maintenance and aren’t as efficient as they should be. The argument to reinvest at some of these businesses is absolutely compelling. People need to look at the numbers, check with their suppliers and work out thoroughly what investment will do. If you are in a reasonable position you should do everything you can to put cash in place for investment."
Mark Nelson, director, Compass Business Finance "A lot of the investments being made are things like digital finishing kit that allow a small profit centre to be brought in-house. There are enough funders around, like ING and Investec, that are quite happy to finance those purchases up to £50,000 or £100,000, where the ROI is easily provable. It’s a brave person who goes out there now and says, we’re going to put a new press in and get £2m of new business. It’s about being flexible and investing in a way that makes you economical now, but allows you to increase capacity if business picks up."
David Bunker, director, Close Print Finance "For many the industry is still about survival. However, print has some tough decisions to make, as many firms that would have had a reinvestment cycle of five to seven years, have been twice or more around that cycle and are sitting on relatively older machinery. We’re talking to a number of firms who are just having to find a way of increasing efficiencies and replacing older kit with new or newer equipment. This is being done with a great deal more time being put into business plans and scenario testing for investments."
Paul Coggins, managing director, Print Finance "My advice would be to look very hard at the capability of your business. The fact many people haven’t invested for the last two to three years means companies are spending more money on maintenance and aren’t as efficient as they should be. The argument to reinvest at some of these businesses is absolutely compelling. People need to look at the numbers, check with their suppliers and work out thoroughly what investment will do. If you are in a reasonable position you should do everything you can to put cash in place for investment."
Mark Nelson, director, Compass Business Finance "A lot of the investments being made are things like digital finishing kit that allow a small profit centre to be brought in-house. There are enough funders around, like ING and Investec, that are quite happy to finance those purchases up to £50,000 or £100,000, where the ROI is easily provable. It’s a brave person who goes out there now and says, we’re going to put a new press in and get £2m of new business. It’s about being flexible and investing in a way that makes you economical now, but allows you to increase capacity if business picks up."
David Bunker, director, Close Print Finance "For many the industry is still about survival. However, print has some tough decisions to make, as many firms that would have had a reinvestment cycle of five to seven years, have been twice or more around that cycle and are sitting on relatively older machinery. We’re talking to a number of firms who are just having to find a way of increasing efficiencies and replacing older kit with new or newer equipment. This is being done with a great deal more time being put into business plans and scenario testing for investments."
