The family firm has ordered a new five-colour Heidelberg Speedmaster XL 75 with coater, due to go into the Edinburgh business in February.
“We are moving up a format to safeguard and grow primarily our cartons and tubes market,” said managing director Jim Thomson.
“We will retain a B3 service but moving to B2 will give customers a wider range of product sizes. Being a B3 printer we were losing out on high-end thickness of material for some of our cartons.
“For us there is only one press that can handle the amount of quality work we produce and the heavier weight stocks, up to 850microns. That's the Speedmaster XL 75.
“It will make a big difference: instead of one carton we will get two from a sheet. The machine cost about £1m and will pay for itself within three years.”
Thomson, who works with wife Veronica and sons Barry and Michael, specialises in packaging for high-end spirits brands.
His 13-staff business turns over £1.6m and also runs a five-colour Heidelberg Speedmaster SX and a Gietz foil-blocking B2 press. He hopes the new machine will push up turnover to £2.3m in a year.
The XL 75 will replace a five-year-old, 13m-impression Speedmaster SM 52 and comes with Prinect Axis Control spectral measurement device that remembers Pantone colours.
This would be useful, as the fifth unit was for special colours, said Thomson, while the coater sealed the ink ready for finishing options including foil blocking, forme-cutting, embossing, debossing, creasing and ram-punching.
Meanwhile Instant Gate and Color Assistant Pro give quick and easy access to job data and the ability to switch and manage runs as well as calibrating and controlling colour on press.
