Security printing can be within your reach

By Bob Atkinson

In printing, as with any business, when the same products and services are offered by a lot of vendors the competition drives prices down over time. These offerings become commodities, sold on the lowest price and usually for the lowest profit. In a tight financial environment, it pays to offer products and services your competitors don’t. This time, let’s look at two types of specialty printing – one long-standing and one brand-new.

SECURITY PRINTING
Security printing, designed to verify authenticity and offer protection from tampering or forgery, dates back to the earliest days of printing when papermakers introduced subtle watermarks to identify their products. Today, there are dozens of security methods used in printing. For example,Canadian paper currency is printed on a combination of restricted cotton-fibre paper stock and clear polymer plastic and uses over a dozen printed security measures. >> continued

Locked in & ready to roll

Since the introduction of high-volume colour digital printing technology 20 years ago, most of the industry's attention has gone to broad commercial print applications, such as direct mail, catalogues, and brochures. Nevertheless, dedicated digital colour label presses have almost as long a history, and their use has accelerated over the past decade. Not only do colour digital label and packaging presses now make up an important segment of the overall digital printer category, digital label presses are widely accepted among both label converters and their customers. Indeed, digital technology is one of the most exciting areas in label printing and converting today.
>> continued

Ricoh unveils the Pro C700X series

Ricoh launched the Pro C700X series, a cutsheet device family that offers a fifth colour station. The new station supports either white or clear ink.  The C7100X prints at speeds of up to 80 ppm and the C7110x at speeds of up to 90 pp, both based upon A4.

They have a maximum sheet size of 13 x 19.2" and maximum monthly volume of 240,000 based on letter size. It prints at 1200x4800 dpi with VCSEL image quality on various substrates, from tree-based paper to synthetics and envelopes. The C7100X series can support paper weights of up to 360gsm in simplex and duplex.

The Ricoh Pro C700X series has a targeted availability of December 2014. >> continued

New from Ricoh: the Pro VC60000 inkjet press

The Ricoh Pro VC60000 is Ricoh's  latest inkjet continuous feed platform. It is capable of printing more than 100,000 letter images per hour and uses Ricoh’s next generation drop-on-demand print heads and high density pigment inks. The new print heads can produce a resolution of up to 1,200 x 1,200 dpi, resulting in near-offset quality documents. Ricoh provides an optional undercoat unit for use on various stocks and an optional inline protector coating unit for scratch and scruff resistance. >> continued

Color-Logic appoints Canadian sales representative

Color-Logic—developer of the process metallic colour system— has named former AGFA and Ernest Green & Sons employee Parker MacDonald as its sales representative for Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritime Provinces. >> continued

Intertainment Media completes sale of Magnum Printing

Intertainment Media has announced the final closing sale of assets of Magnum Fine Commercial Printing limited to 1337478 Ontario Inc., an entity controlled by Media-Vision— a company that specializes in print, web, direct mail, displays and packaging, and premium and incentives work.

The sale transaction closed on Sept. 2 and all Magnum printing assets and employees have been transferred to Media-Visions’ head office on Passmore Ave. where production is located, Media-Vision CEO John Popovski said. >> continued

Shipments on the rise for 2014

There's a big jump in shipments this period but the news is a little too good to be true as sales in most of the country remain flat. The big difference accounting for the jump is that Stats Canada is now tracking Alberta shipments again, after an extended absence.

Shipments (in millions)	2014	2013	% Change
February	$592.8	$547.4	8.3
March	650.4	592.5	9.7
April	652.7	623.0	4.7
May	665.6	627.5	6.0

Year-to-date shipping numbers for 2014 are $3.15 billion. That's a 7.7% jump from the $2.93 posted for the same period in 2013. >> continued

Onwards and upwards for Prodigy Graphics

Prodigy Graphics has donated $12,000 to Evangel Hall Mission (EHM) a charity group that helps homeless individuals get off the streets. The president of the trade shop, Gordon McCauley, presented the money to EHM on July 29.


(left to right) Bob Price, Drop-In Manager EHM; Gordon McCauley, President Prodigy Graphics; Joseph Taylor, Executive Director EHM; Jo Ann Hislop, Director of Programs EHM. >> continued

Third quarter brings greater profitability for Transcontinental

Transcontinental is posting higher profitability in the third quarter. As revenues increased by 1.9% in the third quarter to $500.0 million from $490.7 million at the same time last year, its net earnings rose to $44.2 million from $30.1 million.

The improvements are mostly due to the company’s recent acquisitions: Capri Packaging and Sun Media Corporations’ weekly newspapers in Quebec, as well as new agreements in two operating sectors. However, the company quoted a softer advertising market, which affected revenue growth.

Adjusted earnings rose 11% to $58.3 million from $52.5 million due to the contribution from acquisitions, new printing and distribution agreements, and company-wide optimization of its cost structure and its printing platform. >> continued

Rhino and R.P. Graphics form strategic alliance

R.P. Graphics and Rhino Print Solutions have entered into strategic alliance, the two companies announced Monday. There's two components to the deal: R.P. will buy Rhino's Toronto location, and also establish an alliance with Rhino's locations in Vancouver and Calgary—which are not included in the purchase—to provide printing services to national accounts. The goal is to provide coast-to-coast distribute and print model. 


(left to right) David Allan, George Mazzaferro >> continued