“We took a year to evaluate the machinery before we made a selection,” notes Dennis Low, President of PointOne Graphics in Etobicoke, Ontario. “We carefully looked at the products of all the major web manufacturers. Our customers expect the best in terms of quality, productivity and more bang for the buck. We need to fulfill those expectations. That’s the reason we went with MAN Roland.” What does a successful sheetfed-based trade printer look for in its first web press? PointOne Graphics has formulated some answers to that question in recent years, with high quality, superior productivity and unprecedented versatility topping its list of must-haves. The press it selected is a five-unit MAN Roland ROTOMAN, complete with an array of inline peripherals that will add value to everything it prints. “The ROTOMAN will expand our market reach and make us more efficient and more productive on medium to longer runs,” says Dennis Low. “We’ll be able to increase our offerings — what we can provide to our customers in terms of run length and applications.” As a trade printer, PointOne Graphics is particularly sensitive about providing a one-stop shopping environment for its customers. Send them to some other facility for a long-run project and they may never return. But have a 65,000 impression per hour ROTOMAN in your corner and they may never leave. Perfector Rejecter “The new press will give us the ability to win jobs we weren’t able to compete for with sheetfed equipment,” Dennis Low explains. “The market is changing. The sweet spot for perfectors is being challenged by modern webs like our ROTOMAN. It delivers the quality, while being able to handle shorter runs efficiently. That means it can compete well against the long perfectors.” Scheduled for an April arrival, PointOne’s ROTOMAN features five units and an MAN Roland 1:3:3 folder. Contributing to the press’ productivity will be closed loop color control. But perhaps the most important feature on the new ROTOMAN is its PECOM Extended operating system with Production Manager. “The advanced control systems on the ROTOMAN will allow us to do shorter runs on the web as well,” says Dennis Low, “further extending the types of jobs we can run on it.” Quality Considerations High print quality is a concern for any trade printer because his customers are graphic arts professionals themselves. So they know a first rate print job when they see it, and they’ll settle for nothing less. In addition to being comfortable with the technology, PointOne needed to have faith in its press provider’s ability to support the equipment throughout its lifetime. “We researched two press manufacturers,” Dennis Low recalls. “When we evaluated both, it came down to quality and confidence in the machinery. MAN Roland was the best fit for us. We were not interested in growing into the lower end of the web market. We’re looking at the upper end of the market to produce almost sheetfed quality on our new web. ROTOMAN can do that and that’s why we selected MAN Roland.” Variety Show Dennis Low also gives his new press high marks for versatility: “As a trade printer, we need to cover all our bases and the flexibility of our new ROTOMAN will achieve that for us.” A host of inline production peripherals will equip ROTOMAN to expand PointOne’s product line. The added value technology includes a pattern perforator, a remoist gluer, and a sheeter. “We don’t want to send work away, so we do everything from catalogs to flyers,” Dennis Low comments. “That’s why we’re equipping our ROTOMAN to produce a lot of different types of applications. With it, we can do sheeted products, perfed products, catalogs, and coupons.” Dennis Low does not foresee the ROTOMAN taking over jobs that are currently being produced on his sheetfed fleet. “Perhaps some of the catalog work, but mostly we’ll be going after business we don’t currently have,” he says. Cranking Up the Volume “We’re going to entirely new levels in terms of volume. For example, if a customer brings in a 64-page, 50,000-run magazine, we’re not going to be competitive on that job with our sheetfed presses. With a modern web like the ROTOMAN, we can offer to print the publication at a better price point and win the business.” PointOne plans a multi-part marketing campaign to promote the benefits of its new ROTOMAN. But word of mouth is expected to be the chief generator of jobs for the new press. “Our customers have been asking for a web press for 5-to-6 years now,” Dennis Low observes. “This is not a case of build it and they will come. We’ve been holding them off, while we selected the right web for them. A lot of our clients need both — web and sheetfed printing — and they want the convenience of going to one place to get it. We want to be that destination.”