Baum

The following four printers have experienced success since adding digital finishing equipment into their production inkjet workflows.

The range of finishing available, combined with increasing customer demands for differentiation, has meant that for many shops, creating the balance between offerings and profitability remains delicate. Let's look at five digital printing establishments and how they've created the balance between meeting customer expectations and maintaining profitability.

Not all print shop proprietors have weighed in on the industry’s most pressing question, whether to go “all in” or hedge their bets on digital printing technology. If you plan on catering to both disciplines, having finishing capabilities that speak to the needs of conventional and digital printing is critical.

There were only four offset presses actually running at GRAPH EXPO last month, but the leading vendors still had booths on the show floor. Video presentations, interactive displays, print samples, and standalone press consoles or press units were instead used to showcase new developments, enhanced maintenance offerings and press monitoring services.

Commercial printer company and personnel news from Printing Impressions’ November 2012 edition.

With the fairgrounds spanning 19 halls, it’s simply not practical to cover all that the show had to offer. For a taste of the rest, the following are some of the key announcements made in other hot product categories, including bindy and finishing, digital plates, Web-to-print and wide-format printing.

Mitsubishi Imaging will be hosting an Open House Customer Event Day for small-format printers on Thursday, March 29, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at its Demonstration and Training Center in Rye, NY. Plates from the Thermal DigiPlate chemistry-free CTP system will be run on the BaumPrint 18 automated small-format press during the open house.

The agreement allows Baum to manufacture and distribute the full range of QuadTech hopper loaders and conveyors under the Baum label outside of the Quad/Graphics group of companies. Baum will also be the manufacturer of QuadTech hopper loaders and conveyors for use within the Quad/Graphics group of companies.

The new Baumfolder 714XA AutoFold, affectionately nicknamed the “Baby BAUM,” is an automated tabletop folder to be reckoned with. I was pretty surprised at its hi-tech functionality, and its ability to make fast and tidy gatefolds, tri-folds, double parallels and accordions.

Those lithographic printers walking the show floor earlier this month at Graph Expo in search of a bevy of heavy-iron, offset presses were sorely disappointed. With press manufacturers Heidelberg USA, Komori America and Mitsubishi Lithographic Presses opting to pass on this year's show, the South Hall at McCormick Place lacked the all-encompassing lineup of traditional press vendors that visitors in years past have come to expect.