Finishing & Screen Printing
Foundry Press adds stitching power to meet rising demand
Friday 11. April 2008 - A Stitchmaster ST 350 has been delivered to Foundry Press in Horsham concurrently with it achieving FSC Chain of Custody status, an accreditation which brought in four new projects in the first week that previously would not have been placed with the company.
Less than 300 of the UKs 10,500 printers are believe to hold FSC rating to date and Foundry has discovered that many buyers are swayed by it because they want to run the FSC logo to prove their environmental credentials.
Work at Foundry has been busy since the installation of its Speedmaster CD 74-10P two years ago, along with CtP and folding additions. There was a bottleneck in finishing so the company decided to replace its 11 year old Prosetter 455 with the ST350.
“We liked the fact it was speedy, accurate and had a stacker that suits some of the work we handle,” says Bruce Phillips, managing director. “Alan Houlison, our operations director, looked at rival equipment but felt the ST350 was sounder from a Health & Safety viewpoint and we have a good relationship with Heidelberg and know the quality of equipment and support we will get.”
The company has opted for a four-station line with cover feeder. Foundry says that space and the level of demand make having cut-fold-stitch in-house but perfect binding put out to the trade the right balance for its business.
Foundry Press is funding the Stitchmaster through a consumables deal on plates, inks, blankets and toner for its Epson proofer. Unusually it is not repaying in relation to the volume of consumables used but has opted for fixed monthly payments. Over the past year seasonality seems to have disappeared and it wants to be sure repayments and equipment write offs marry up.
FSC accreditation comes on top of ISO 9001, 12647 and 14001 quality and environmental accreditations.