Clays helps make headlines by printing Trump book

Clays has found itself at the heart of one of 2018’s biggest stories so far as it took up the commission to print a scathing exposé of Donald Trump’s first year in the White House.

Fire & Fury is the now-notorious tome from journalist Michael Wolff, written from records of his unprecedented access to key figures in the US president’s team over 2017. It has been blasted by Trump supporters as “fake news” written to discredit the President, while opposition figures have welcomed it as confirmation of Trump’s inability to govern.

Suffolk-based Clays was commissioned to print the book in the UK by publishers Little, Brown Book Group and had to accommodate for an increase in demand when the book stormed the headlines. The latest figures from Nielsen BookScan show Fire & Fury has sold 59,468 copies in the UK.

“We worked as one team with Little, Brown, linking with their sales and production employees,” said Clays sales director Vicky Ellis. “As well as delivering into their West Sussex warehouse, we carried out direct deliveries to retailers to meet the schedules.

“We are able to react quickly and flexibly with our customers when this kind of sudden unexpected high demand comes along. Little, Brown received high praise from the booksellers about how they reacted to the demand and we feel proud to have been part of that team to make it work.

Fire & Fury continues to get media coverage and while this is happening we expect there to be the demand for more copies to be printed.”

The book’s text pages were printed by Clays on a Timson Royal press and its cover on a UV Komori sheetfed colour press. It was finished using Muller Martini C12 binding lines and Kolbus casing in-lines running at 70 cycles per minute.

Clays, a St Ives subsidiary, has a team of 650 employees working at its 77,000sqm site.