My Print Partners brings laminating in-house

Commercial printer My Print Partners has invested in a GBC Delta laminator with Automatic Deep Pile Feeder and Suction Head to bring laminating in-house.

The fully automatic continuous B2 laminator, which was purchased secondhand from Wakefield-based reseller Grafitec for £10,000, was installed at the Sheffield-based printer’s 465sqm premises at the end of November.

The business was previously operating a small thermal hand-fed laminator, which it has retained.

“We bought it to bring work back in-house, reduce time and admin and speed up jobs getting through the system to enable the best service for our customers,” said director Ian McCloskey, who set up the business with Richard Green and Richard Tims in summer 2014.

“We shopped around and looked at alternatives - including a brand new machine - but we just didn’t want to commit at that level at that moment in time,” said McCloskey.

“This is a stepping stone for us and in a couple of years we’ll look at investing into a brand new machine.

The business also operates a five-colour Heidelberg SM 74, a Xerox J75 digital colour press, a Horizon SPF/FC-200A stitch-fold-trim line, a Heidelberg Cylinder, a guillotine, a thermal laminator, a number of folders and processless CTP.

My Print Partners, which has 12 staff, achieved a first-year turnover of £800,000 and is aiming for a second-year turnover of £1m. Its services include direct mail, packing, personalisation, POS and other commercial print work.