Founded in September last year by graphic designer Matthew Anderson, Bow is a Swansea-based firm with three members of staff. Acquiring assets from a print company moving out of the signage industry, including a Roland VersaCamm SP-540, Anderson set the company to work with a number of print agents before moving on to commercial contracts.

Installed at the end of February, the 1.6m-wide TrueVis immediately started making back its £15,500 price tag by helping the company win a contract with Tesco to produce the window displays for the national supermarket chain’s spring/summer campaign.

“Our other Roland machine is 14 years old and continues to trundle away in the background,” said Anderson. “But we wanted to move into bigger work by upgrading our capacity. I was already familiar with Roland, but did take a look at other machines.

“After seeing a couple of alternatives, like an HP latex machine, I fell in love the with TrueVis. I know we would not have won the Tesco contract without it.

“The speed and quality are great and the RIP is almost identical to the VersaCamm's, so I knew it would be easy to use. You know what you’re getting with Roland, and that’s a quality machine.”

Roland’s TrueVis VG-640 can print at speeds up to 35sqm/hr, depending on quality level, with a maximum resolution of 900dpi. It cuts at up to 300mm/second.

Bow Design has now also taken on a sales manager – its third member of staff – to help win and maintain contracts. It also operates CNC and lamination technology.

Anderson said: “In the next six months I want to hire an in-house graphic designer and someone who can run the Roland machine as well as laying graphics on. In the long term, I want us to become the biggest signage printer in Wales.”

The firm currently has a monthly turnover circa £20,000 and is based on 370sqm premises.