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Product category: Printing Presses and Machinery (New and Used, Service and Repair)
News Release from: KBA | Subject: Rapida 74G Press
Edited by the Printingtalk Editorial Team on 04 October 2004

Waterless Mark In Environmentally Aware
Market

Environmental awareness and a social conscience are both rated highly in Scandinavia.

Environmental awareness and a social conscience are both rated highly in Scandinavia That is particularly true in Sweden, where virtually every form of production must comply with vigorous ecological standards

For some years now the Swedish government has been passing legislation to limit emissions during print production.

A reduction in isopropyl alcohol (IPA) is just one of its aims.

Swedish print media enterprise Cela Grafiska has not only proven that this can be accomplished at no great expense, but has also demonstrated that it can dramatically enhance performance.

German press manufacturer KBA believes that waterless offset is very much the printing process of the future in Sweden.

To reflect that, this year Cela Grafiska wrapped up the biggest investment packet in its history, initiating a transition to waterless offset with the first KBA Rapida 74 G (Gravuflow) sheetfed press to roll off the production line.

But the main reason the company chose this particular press was not its environmentally friendly waterless technology but its ability to be embedded in a digital production workflow as a print output device, like the 74 Karat.

Cela Grafiska opted for a unit-built press because it can handle a wider range of substrates than a DI offset press.

Also, a deliberate decision was made to maintain a stand-alone platemaking line so as to keep options wide open for future additions to production equipment.

"As soon as the Rapida 74 G was unveiled, we knew it was the press for us.

Its format, broad substrate range, four-colour capability with inline coating option, its superior print quality and low tolerances within the print run, thanks to the waterless offset process, were just the ticket for the jobs we handle.

But even with just the one press we are still competitive against other sheet formats," said Joachim Friberg, one of the four proprietors of Cela Grafiska.

The waterless Rapida 74 G replaced a conventional press and is currently Cela's sole means of production.

"The direct link between pre-press and press enables us to make ready and run up to saleable colour in a minimum of time and with a minimum of waste.

The quality delivered, especially in image and solids reproduction, beats other offset presses hands-down.

On top of this, production prints match the proofs one-hundred per cent, there is zero tolerance," he continued.

The company believes that with the Rapida 74 G it can compete on price in both smaller and larger sheet formats up to B1.

That is partly because its customers are now confident that the proof and print would be identical.

Out of a total of 1,500, only two still come to approve printwork in person at the press.

That means the company can turn jobs around much faster than other printing plants.

The ability to apply an aqueous coating with the inline coater also delivers substantial time savings, since work and turn jobs can be passed through the press a second time almost straight away.

Cela has been so pleased with the performance of the Rapida 74 G that it is thinking about adding another KBA press, this time a Genius 52 or Rapida 74 G for printing plastic.

Local government is one of the biggest print buyers in the Vonersborg region, and Cela Grafiska prints general information brochures, public transport timetables and large batches of tourist leaflets for public bodies.

"We are especially keen to get this kind of print work because as a rule the various departments award three-year or four-year contracts However, the conditions of tender are very strict, with environmental credentials playing a major role," explained Friberg.

Here Cela believes it holds a strong hand, not just because of its environmentally friendly printing process but also because it believes it delivers a consistently superior print quality and can meet tight deadlines.

According to Joachim Friberg, Cela's corporate history means that it has a high level of pre-press competence, a facet that many of its customers - which include publishers of popular and trade magazines - appreciate.

That is another sector that Cela serves, along with customer magazines: because the country's population is too small to warrant high-volume print runs, a lot of magazine titles are printed on sheetfed presses.

Pre-press takes up more floor space at Cela than the actual production department.

To address the diverse needs of its 1,500-strong customer base Cela has evolved not just into a cross between a pre-press agency and a printshop but also into a provider of print and IT services as well.

Friberg, who retired last year from hands-on management, said: "We don't just sell print: for many of our customers we also design the product, provide the photographic material, process the images and manage the data." According to Friberg, self-sufficiency is of the first importance.

"We simply cannot spare the time to wait for IT specialists to drive out from Goteborg, the distance is just too great.

Distance also makes it difficult to work with external photographers and service providers.

The same applies to post-press work, which we also do in-house.

This, incidentally, is a major selling point among our customers: as far as their print work is concerned, many of them want to have a one-stop service." A mid-size Swedish company with less than 20 employees, Cela Grafiska evolved a few years ago from a merger between a commercial printing company dating back to 1848 and an advertising agency established in 1992.

The company employs almost 20 staff and is a mid-size print operation by Swedish standards.

Since its creation it has gone from strength to strength, posting annual growth rates of 25 per cent to 30 per cent.

In 2003 it generated sales totalling around 14 million Krona, the equivalent of 1.53m Euros ($1.87m).

KBA said it has secured two more 74 G press sales in southern Sweden to Eson Pac, a specialist printer of pharmaceutical packaging, and one in Denmark.

Since Sweden has a relatively small population of nine million, the print market is more like an assortment of agencies by nature in KBA's opinion and that fragmentation makes it more open to innovation.

Most printing plants - KBA estimates around 90 per cent to 95 per cent - employ between just three and 15 people.

Surprisingly, they tend to operate more like studios or service providers than craftsmen.

Cela Grafiska in Vonersborg, 80 kilometres (50 miles) north of Goteborg, is a good example of such an enterprise.

Nestling on the shores of Lake Vonern, Vonersborg is the regional capital of south-west Sweden.

It is also one of the fastest growing regions in Sweden.

Vornersborg is surrounded by factories and assembly plants supplying the automotive, mobile communications and pharmaceutical industries.

KBA observed that in Scandinavia, it is the small businesses that are most receptive to new ideas.

In Cela's case, one reason is that it prints just about everything that can be put to paper, usually in four colours.

Because Sweden is such a small country, average run lengths are shorter than in the rest of Europe, so profit margins depend more on fast make-ready and low waste figures than on high-speed production.

Even so, there has been no widespread adoption of digital print production, perhaps because quality expectations in Scandinavia are exceptionally high. Request a free brochure from KBA ...

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