The Bootle based trade finisher offers a broad range of services, mainly to local printers, although founder and managing director Phil Keating explains that this investment was made partly to help him attract work from further afield.
“We manufacture stitched brochures, die-cut folders, glued cartons, carriers for store cards, kiss-cut labels and paint colour-matching brochures,” he says. “As the trade moves to shorter-run digital work we are also producing a lot of digitally printed work.
“Trade finishing is highly competitive, so I have been looking to diversify into other niche areas,” he says. “More specialist types of folding and gluing is one such area, and after research I discovered the machine most capable of providing the greatest benefits was the ProFold 74.”
Being able to develop new products will help him to stand out from the crowd, he anticipates. “It’s hard to sell die-cutting in Liverpool, for example, as there are five to 10 other people doing it. But you can count on the fingers of one hand the number of firms that offer capacity gluing services.”
Kama is a German manufacturer which was founded in Dresden in 1894 as Sächsische Cartonnagen-Maschinen-Aktiengesellschaft (Saxony Carton Machinery Corporation), which was mercifully contracted to SCAMAG. Founder Teodor Remus developed the first crease-line system to facilitate the production of folding cartons. By 1936 the company was renamed Kama and launched the world’s first automatic die-cutter. By the 1970s it was building folder-gluers and in 1994 it was reconstituted as a GmbH, the German equivalent of a limited company. Friedheim International has been Kama’s UK distributor since 2012.
In recent years Kama has particularly concentrated on high build-quality finishing machinery with innovative quick- makeready features to support short runs. At this year’s Drupa it showed the latest implementation of its folder-gluer expertise with the introduction of the FlexFold 52i, an enhanced version of what’s claimed to be the world’s first folder-gluer designed for short-run, relatively small-format folding cartons. This would complement the new breed of B2 digital carton presses and can run in conjunction with the Kama DC 72 short-makeready carton die-cutter.
Although Finishing Solutions has the first ProFold 74 in the UK, it’s not a new machine, having been shown as a prototype at Ipex 2010 and sold in around 20 other countries already. Its grid tool mounting system was granted a European patent in 2012. Since introduction Kama has released new tools and options that can be added to existing machines.
The ProFold 74 is a modular finishing system with a range of optional add-on tools, for folding flaps, gluing pockets and folders with capacity, add-on samples or cards and automatically placing tape and closing folders. The idea is that it can automate a lot of operations that would otherwise have to be performed manually for short-run finishing.
Above and beyond
Simply calling the ProFold a folder-gluer rather underplays its capabilities. Its grid-type tool mounting system means you can configure it to create pretty well for whatever you need. Kama says for example it can make presentation folders, CD pockets, greetings cards, photo frames, magazine and brochure covers, ticket envelopes, cross folders or folded boxes with crash-lock base. Actually the full list of official possibilities is a lot longer but we don’t have room for them all, while on top of that there’s scope for products that even Kama hasn’t thought of yet.
In 2010 Kama published ProFold Configurator, an interactive section of its website that lets potential users determine which modules and tools will be needed to perform particular job types. ProFolds can be supplied with job planning software to simulate jobs on-screen, determine the tool set-up and store the results for later re-runs, although it doesn’t set up the machine remotely. It can also calculate costs. Finishing Solutions did not opt for this software.
The ProFold is highly configurable. Finishing Solutions has the creasing unit for inline creasing, folding and gluing with optional small-format handling kit, plus a capacity unit for producing capacity pocket folders, a 90° turner, a hotmelt gluing system, a zig zag concertina folding unit for collapsible capacity folders (such as medical/legal wallets) and a taping unit for applying tape inline. 28 tool fixing clamps were included. For this configuration Finishing Solutions paid around £150,000.
“The tooling is located on the machine for each job that is run. Air and glue systems are controlled via an electronic panel, but the folding operations are mechanical and have to be added to the machine specifically for the job you are running. Clearly this means that set-ups can be complex, as you are building it from scratch. It is a steep learning curve, but as the machine is well designed and engineered there is no great heartache to it.”
Well engineered
Before deciding on the ProFold, Keating considered machines from Petratto and Kluge. “I bought the Kama because it was a well designed and engineered machine for a competitive price,” he says. “It was reassuring that Friedheim supplied the machine because after-sale service was not going to be a problem. The machine was up and running the next day.
“It allows me to offer a wider range of gluing services and sets me apart from the hundreds of other finishers offering services to printers. Hopefully it will also enable us to increase our footprint from a local service to a regional or even national one.
“The machine surpasses its specifications, as the lock and load nature of its build allows you to produce work that it is not necessarily designed to do,” says Keating. “But if it can be conceived in the operator’s mind, often it can be turned into reality on the machine due to the versatile modular design.”
He reports Friedheim’s service has been exemplary. However, he adds that the ProFold itself is “complex and very unforgiving of errors, if the glue gets anywhere it shouldn’t be, the machine has to be stopped and cleaned or the job will mark”.
“The best thing is what it can do to take Finishing Solutions forward as a company. The worst thing is that it is a new and complex that requires maximum concentration and attention to detail, But as a trade Finisher that goes with the territory.”
Would he buy it again? “Yes it’s been a good investment. I have bought many machines over the years, Not all have turned out to be good choices. But this investment has been the right machine at the right time from the right supplier. That’s a very difficult combination of needs to satisfy. Would I recommend it? Yes.”
SPECIFICATIONS
Materials Paper, cardboard, plastics
Stock weight range 100-600gsm
Max sheet width 740mm
Min sheet size 100x80mm
Min product size 50x80mm
Max linear speed 150m/min
Max performance capacity (general) 36,000cph
Max performance capacity (folders) 6,000cph
Footprint (standard configuration) 5.5x1m
Price From about £110,000. Finishing Solutions’ configuration was £150,000.
Contact Friedheim International 01442 206100 www.friedheim.co.uk
Company profile
Finishing Solutions is based in Bootle on Merseyside and has been providing trade finishing services to printers for more than 20 years. It employs 20 people and has a turnover of around £800,000. 10 staff are on site for hand finishing and the company can also call on home workers.
In addition to the Kama ProFold 74, its other main production equipment includes a Bobst B1 die-cutter as well as Heidelberg cylinder presses and a platen for die-cutting and embossing. It also runs an Autobond B1 laminator, Stahl and MBO folders, two Moll Pocket folder-gluers and two Harris stitchers. Unusually for a trade finisher, the company can make its own cutting and creasing dies, using a Sei System laser board cutter and Wonder Bender automatic rule processor. The laser can also be used for cutting plastics such as acrylics.
Why it was bought...
Finishing Solutions opted for the ProFold 74 to achieve a degree of differentiation in the competitive trade finishing sector and grow its business catchment area. Founder and managing director Phil Keating says: “It allows me to offer a wider range of gluing services and sets me apart.” He adds: “Finishing is highly competitive and the choices we make as owners can make or break a company.”
How it has performed...
“It takes us into niche areas that are not serviced by a thousand other finishers,” says Keating. “This allows us to offer our services further afield. I am very happy with the Kama folder-gluer. But the story does not end there; as well as making sure this is a long-term success we must consider what else we can do to take the company forward. Like other businesses in the print sector we have suffered our ups and downs, but despite this we are thriving and investing.”
