Workflow
Long standing family business LeA Printers makes 50% time saving in processing files with installation of Fujifilms XMF workflow
Thursday 30. July 2009 - LeA Printers is a well established commercial printer based in Orpington, Kent, offering a complete turnkey solution to its clients. With a full range of printing equipment covering offset, digital, large format, and finishing & mailing capabilities in house, the business has grown over the last 17 years from being able to offer two colour printing and some hand finishing in the mid nineties to the vast range of options that customers require in 2009 from initial designs through to final printed and mailed material.
As the company has expanded, ongoing investment in equipment has meant a move to its existing premises four years ago. It serves clients up and down the country printing a wide range of publicity material, direct mail and POS end products.
Investment in workflow
As the business, grew the entry level workflow solution that was in place in the prepress department simply couldnt cope with the volume of files coming through the system, particularly with the latest advances in PDF technology, and could take many hours to RIP a file. Although the prepress department had become adept at work arounds to try and alleviate the issue, it was clear that investment in an up-to-date workflow system was a must in order to remain at the cutting edge of technology and to continue to offer clients the best possible service.
As Paul Gill, technical and joint managing director at LeA, explains: “We desperately needed to increase the speed of our workflow and cut down on the time spent preparing files for print, whilst also bringing in the capability to plan jobs better in order to increase our efficiency. We were looking for a system where everything was handled in one package. In addition, we needed the ability to export preflighted PDF proofs to send to our customers.”
Of utmost importance to LeA was that the workflow chosen would integrate well with the companys current CTP equipment, as well as having the potential to RIP to offset and digital presses if necessary. Paul continues: “We investigated a number of the leading workflow solutions on the market during 2008, but Fujifilms XMF having been built from the ground up using XML seemed to be the most appropriate for what we wanted to achieve, and given our existing relationship with Fuji we knew that any service and support we received would be fantastic.”
Supplier confidence
LeA has been a long-standing customer of Fujifilm and found the company to have a great track record in both the quality of products and service. As Paul highlights: “We have tremendous confidence in Fujifilm with the company having supplied our LP-NV plates and platesetters for many years, so we already had first hand experience of the excellent support they give and the stability of the Fujifilm products in general. This combined with the capabilities of XMF compared with other products out there cemented our decision.”
Since installing XMF, LeA has reaped a whole host of benefits for the business. “Weve been achieving a 50% time saving in the planning, ripping and proofing stages of the jobs that we handle through the prepress department.” Paul explains. “This is invaluable to us as it means we can potentially double the number of jobs we process in a day, allowing us to increase our turnover as well as reducing the amount of overtime our employees were working when we were using our previous system,” he adds.
“We were also impressed with the speed at which the new system was installed, as it was all complete within one day,” he continues. “Our prepress department attended training courses to familiarise themselves with the workflow and then we were up and running in no time.”
The usability of the software has also proved popular with the prepress department at LeA, as David Applegate, prepress manager testifies: “Having had experience of other workflow solutions, I find that Fujifilms XMF is extremely intuitive and easy to use. After working with it for just a couple of weeks, both myself and my colleagues in the department felt that we really knew it inside out. It has made a huge difference to how the department operates.”
“We are extremely pleased that we took the decision to invest in XMF,” concludes Paul. “The confidence it gives us as a company also rubs off on our customers, and when the time is right we will be interested in adding the Remote module so that our clients can potentially proof their work via the Internet.”