CHICAGO, IL -- As a completely modular system, one of the great advantages to having a Watkiss Vario Collating and Finishing System is the great flexibility it has to offer. Holding its exclusive distribution rights in the U.S. and South America provides A.B.Dick Company choice opportunities on the post-press side. At the Print 01 show, A.B.Dick (booth #3329) will offer visitors a new way to look at Watkiss Vario equipment. "We have re-packaged the Watkiss Vario equipment and assembled them into four smart systems," said Steve Cutler, A.B.Dick's product manager for the line. "We re-examined how the equipment works and who it worked for. Putting together systems that offer tremendous flexibility and value eliminated the guesswork involved. This bundling of equipment really makes sense and gives a printer the opportunity to add onto it in the future." Long considered an advanced, user-friendly and reliable performer, the Watkiss Vario system still gives printers the option to customize their collating solutions. While conventional methods require a fixed number of bins, Watkiss Vario maintains a high degree of flexibility. The exact number and type of bins necessary for different size operations can be modified at any time. The first three systems (6, 8 and 12-bins) are designed for the traditional print market; the fourth (a document finishing system) is for digital printing, including the A.B.Dick Colour press. System 1 is the lone friction feed system; the others rely on patented SlimVAC rotary vacuum feed bins to collate with almost no adjustments necessary. The entry-level system 1, with six friction feed bins, includes a manual BookMaster staple, fold and trim booklet maker which is easy to operate and is virtually maintenance free. It is designed for customers who will collate less than 100,000 sheets of paper or produce less than 10,000 booklets per month. System 2 is an intermediate, eight-bin collator that comes with an automatic BookMaster solution. A single user-friendly control panel runs the system and makes it possible to switch from collating to booklet making instantly. System 3 is for the largest users who want to achieve high speed production and consistent quality. The 12-bin unit can saddle stitch and fold, edge or corner stitch and fold, or edge and corner stitch without folding. It also has a hand merge unit which can make thicker books up to 24 sheets. System 4 is an off-line document finishing system that will transform digital printing into high value stitched booklets. Like systems 2 and 3, it comes with an automatic BookMaster solution and provides flexible workflow where the finisher is not tied to a single printer. More productive compared to on-line finishing -- which reduces speed -- it is available with five bins and can make booklets from pre-collated sets or used as a regular collator for batch printed sets.