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Polestar and William Gibbons win Future magazine contracts
Polestar and William Gibbons have won contracts to print a number of magazines formerly produced at Wyndeham Heron and Southernprint, following a review by Future Publishing.
Future would not comment on which of its titles were involved in the tender, although PrintWeek understands that it included all magazines printed for the publisher by both Wyndeham and Southernprint.
Future said the decision was made based on "capability, quality and price", following accusations by Wyndeham that the contract was awarded based solely on price.
A spokesman for Wyndeham said: "Wyndeham Heron has enjoyed an 18-year business partnership with Future Publishing where we have consistently delivered an extremely high-quality product and service levels.
"It is therefore hugely disappointing to lose the work solely on price, but we are not prepared to compromise our quality standards for such low returns."
Future responded: "As part of our normal business review process we invited tenders from printers for a number of our magazines.
"The quantity and quality of response was extremely high. We evaluated these bids based on the right blend of capability, quality and price, and Polestar and William Gibbons were both successful.
"We never compromise on the quality of our products, this is very important to us. We are very happy with our decision and look forward to a successful relationship going forward."
Meanwhile, Southernprint managing director Charles Jarrold has hit out at Polestar for what he sees as an unsustainable approach to pricing.
He said: "We chose not to go to the price levels that have been submitted. We find it utterly bizarre that a large loss-making competitor like Polestar sees that it is appropriate to offer these sorts of price levels in a world where all of our costs are going up. We are not prepared to operate at those price levels. We simply can’t.
"It wasn’t a terribly difficult decision for us frankly, although we clearly do not like walking away from long-standing customers with whom we have had a great relationship. We understand that they have their commercial reasons and we have no fundamental problem with that, they must make decisions in a way that they feel is in their interest."
James Povey, marketing director at Polestar, said: "We are delighted to have been successful in winning this work from Future. It is our understanding that we were certainly not the cheapest option. That is simply not our policy. The main reason we lose work is for reasons of price – in the UK and across Europe.
"Therefore, we really question the selective comments we have seen from these two competitors. Both have undercut Polestar on many occasions on both spot and contractual work, as buyers and printers who understand the market are well aware.
"The fact is, the industry continues to keep hold of equipment that is not sustainable for the future. Polestar has had the same issues and is continually reviewing capacity in line with market requirements. Supply and demand rules in printing, and while suppliers to the publishing industry continue to keep capacity open that is not sustainable, this is what we will be seeing.
"Polestar will never drive down market price. However, if we believe that both the work and market price is right for Polestar, we will compete, and as this exercise has proven, win."
For more, see next week's PrintWeek.
Future: we invited tenders from printers for a number of our magazines
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Comments
Print Spectator - 03 October 2008
Unfortunately, buyers dont drive prices down, printers do.
And while we all price ourselves into the ground, customers must realise that it has to come from somewhere and that somewhere can only be the job.
Let them fill themselves up with non profitable work, it might hasten their demise. Then we can get back some kind of commercial sanity.
the PM - 05 October 2008
so what is new
Silver Hammer - 06 October 2008
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! I place regular spot work and
contract work with all the UK offset printers, and you can't single out
Polestar. In fact I rarely find them the cheapest, though the two that have
lost Future generally under cut Polestar, and there are 2/ 3 others out
there who I would always expect to pile in the lowest price. There is tons
of capacity out there and I would expect printers to be hungry as is seen in
the pricing I get. Long may it continue...........
Simon Biltcliffe- Webmart - 06 October 2008
All three printers are extremely good at printing, customer service and are competitive & we use all three.
The rankings from our clients & our production team combined are as follows \( last 30 days):
Polestar 9.29/10
Wm Gibbons 9.42/10
Southernprint 9.40/10
The fact is there are very few bad web-printers left in the UK, so it is down to the commercial view of the client who they chose based on price and strategic direction of their printers. Sad thing is that the timing looks like it is kicking Wyndham when they are down \( obviously not planned though!).
Simon Biltcliffe
MD
WEBMART
lordof weboffset - 06 October 2008
Same old Polestar!
Neil Taylor - 08 October 2008
It would be naive to believe Future's final decision was on any other criteria than price. How else can you differentiate between Southernprint and Polestar when the tender paperwork is so detailed and paper is supplied? I applaud suppliers who refuse to accept work at loss making levels as St Ives did with Emap. Some of you may struggle to believe that yes you are reading the comments of a print manager but without financially secure, profitable suppliers I have no business...Maybe its time for UK web printers to start thinking like their European counterparts and fill their presses with work they are suited/equipped forrather than purelyvolume at huge discount, not to mention risk!
The Mighty wind - 10 October 2008
I seem to remember comments such as " there is no such thing as too low a price" and some kind of pricing structure based on a twenty year plan.
Alan Partridge - 10 October 2008
The reason there pricing is much of a muchness, is because so is their service. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, but Web printers continue to be inflexible and production led, rather than selling an actual added value 'service' to the client.
Despite the above though, you'll still hear the web guys saying 'it's these print managers who've driven the prices down' - Hello???
If you offer a commodity in the marketplace you'll continue to get paid commodity rates to match, if you offer a service and listen to what your clients actually really want \(apart from actual ink on paper) you'll generate better margins.
Printers are sitting waiting for 'market forces' to drive up prices as appose to moving with the times, and I reckon they'll be waiting a long time
Alan Partridge
BBC Norwich Radio
The Mighty wind - 13 October 2008
You make some valid points alan, the price structure in web offset is currently driving out profit in the sector however there is very little that is new in economics [despite the eureka moments every now and then]. The current mis- match in supply and demand has driven the price down and both PM companies [not all] and fellow competitors have followed this trend. However the gap between supply and demand is closing fast [weekend rates and slots are tighter] and with a number of printers in serious trouble the supply side is shrinking fast. UK buyers may believe that European plants will take up the shortfall [when it fully materializes] but they are having many problems themselves and in some ways are a little behind on the road travelled by many UK printers already. I do not believe that printers will have to wait a long time for "market forces" to correct the situation I believe it is already happening but time will be the best judge of that.
Your point on web houses being too production led is a valid one, but the industry is notoriously low on professional management and the many points of potential failure in the production process often lead to a cycle of panic-blind panic- chaos- sigh of relief-back to panic.
Alan Partridge - 22 October 2008
By your intelligent and obviously very well informed comments mighty wind, I can condifently assume you are far better placed in the web market than I to judge weather or not the scales are beggining to tip the other way as far as supply and demand are concerned. This is a subject that interests me greatly as I believe very much in economic cycles, and, after 10 years+ of over capacity in most areas of the Print industry and eroding margins as a result, are we slowly starting to turn a corner (led by web)?
If this happens in Web, it will almost certainly be followed by other areas of the industry (just as the original down turn did 10 years ago). I believe margins in Direct Mail manufacturing of which i have slightly more knowledge, 'bottomed out' about 18months ago and are already on the up, even in today's economic climate.
Whilst we are only seeing early signs of change and there is still along way to go, I don't think that many poeple out there actually realise what it could mean if capacity continues to shrink as companies go to the wall, and there continues to be a decline in skills throughout the industry.
It would almost certainly mean; some real margin back in the manufacturing side of the industry, less buying power from the 'print manager', end users being more keen to sign contracts with manufactures, capacity attracting premiums, etc.
Bi-products of this would eventually be; complacancy amongst manufacturers, service levels perhaps dropping,less competition, less innovation being offered, less flexibility being offered. In other words it becomes the 'sellers market'.
Funnily enough, does the last paragraph remind you of anything? Kind of reminds me of the mid nineties before overcacity started biting in the first place. Interesting stuff.
Maybe we've all had it tough for long enough
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