John Watson hits out at RBS following funding refusal

John Watson chief executive of the eponymous independent label and commercial printer has hit out at Royal Bank of Scotland for not releasing funds to its customers to fuel investments, claiming it is damaging the economy and hampering job creation.

The company has ended a 185-year relationship with the bank after John Watson & Co was forced to turn its attentions to Switzerland in a bid to secure finance for its recent £3m investment in a 10-colour Gallus Pressure Sensitive Label press.

Speaking to The Herald, Watson said that the company has subsequently secured the funding from an unnamed UK bank but at a time of need, RBS were "certainly not here for me".

He added: "They have to sort the bonus culture out and start releasing funds.

"If I can’t get funding, and I have been profitable every year in my 40-odd years with the business who can get funding in the printing industry?"

Responding to the newspaper, RBS said it approved more than 85% of applications for credit and "are constantly looking to improve upon that number"

According to RBS, it had extended gross new lending facilities of £7.6bn to small and medium-sized enterprises during the third quarter of this year, an 8% increase from the previous quarter.

The company will begin production on the Gallus machine at its Townhead facility, Glasgow in February 2011.

The 80-staff company's Gallus machine will enable it to broaden its product offering for customers such as whisky businesses in the drinks industry.

Installation of the Gallus press comes on the back of increased demand from customers requiring self-adhesive labels for drinks bottles, a move away from the more traditional wet labelling process.

Watson said: "The self adhesive process will enable customers to increase the bottling speeds with often an improvement to the quality of the label too."