Hi-Liter Adds New Hardware

MENOMONEE FALLS, WI—It’s been an active fall capex season for the Hi-Liter Graphics/Inland Graphics franchise, and 2007 is already shaping up to be pretty active.

A 10-color Heidelberg Speedmaster 102 sheetfed press with perfector came online at Inland Graphics in October, according to Craig Faust, president and CEO of the organization. The press joins an existing four-color perfecting press.

Hi-Liter Graphics, in Burlington, WI, is also augmenting its press firepower with the order of a four-color, 32-page 4x4 MAN Roland Uniset web offset press. Faust and Co. signed the contract days prior to Graph Expo; once constructed, the web press will be installed and operating sometime next fall.

Hi-Liter took an exhaustive look at the available models that most closely matched its needs, and also mulled over pre-used gear.

“We produce a lot of short-run, quick makeready, high-page-count books—specialty and niche publications, a lot of digest work. So we needed a quick-makeready press that is also user-friendly,” Faust notes. “For us, the decision came down to the unique capabilities the Uniset offers that we can leverage with our current customer base. It opens up our capacity through the efficiency of delivering 32s versus 16s.”

The 32-page machine will complement Hi-Liter’s 2x4 formats at the Burlington location, which features both heatset and coldset web presses.