ROLLING MEADOWS, Ill. -- As a driving force in the digital book manufacturing industry, Total Printing Systems possesses a straightforward but highly effective business ethic.

"We take immense pride in what we do and work hard to keep our customers happy," stated Rick Lindemann, vice president of operations at the family-owned firm.

With its wide range of capabilities, Total Printing Systems is always willing to make technology decisions that benefit customers and allow the Newton, Ill.-based company to improve print products. The equipment mix just became more diverse thanks to a newly installed Truepress Jet520, Screen's full-color inkjet web press.

"We try to stay current with the latest technology," Lindemann said. "The demand for color capabilities from book publishers is growing substantially. We have been in the process of implementing a technology change for the past year and a half because we wanted to increase the color segment of our business. We looked at the machines that are commercially available and the ones that were previewed at Drupa 2008 that aren't yet commercially available. The Truepress Jet520 offered higher print resolution than the other available solutions. We felt confident it would provide better quality for our customers."

Total Printing Systems has long been on the leading edge of emerging technology. The printer was an early adopter of black-and-white digital printing machines for short-run and just-in-time book production. Likewise, the 47-employee shop pioneered the use of the web-fed inkjet platform dedicated to book manufacturing.

"We also were one of the first book manufacturers to utilize computer-to-plate production in prepress and have had an online pricing system in place since 1997," Lindemann pointed out.

Lindemann's parents, Richard and Wendy, founded Total Printing Systems in 1973 originally to produce commercial projects. However, the company quickly turned its attention to governmental publications. Initially, text pages were run on Didde web presses, then collated and bound.

Today, the full-service printer produces bound educational books and materials, auto part catalogs, trade publications, directories and religious books. Adhesive case binding, mechanical binding, perfect binding and saddle-stitching are among the finishing options from which customers can choose. Clients include publishing giants, as well as small publishing companies and self-publish authors.

"The products we focus on are mainly short-run to medium-run book publishing in the range of 50 to 5,000 copies," Lindemann said.

Inside the 32,000-square-foot plant, Total Printing Systems' non-heatset web presses (three two-unit models), small sheetfeds (four one-color presses) and various toner-based and inkjet presses (one-color to four-color) operate around the clock, five days a week.

"We print well over 30 million black-and-white impressions and 700,000 color impressions per month," Lindemann said. "Some of the black-and-white work will transition to the Truepress Jet520 to give our customers higher print quality. As for color interiors, we conservatively estimate that the number of impressions will increase to 2 million within nine months."

Excelling at speed and quality with variable-printing capability, the Truepress Jet520 at Total Printing Systems combines two print engines to print full web, duplex. It boasts a maximum image resolution of 720 dpi x 720 dpi. The continuous-inkjet press can produce full-process color on inkjet paper, standard paper and uncoated paper at speeds of up to 420 feet per minute. With a print width of 20 inches and a paper width of 20.4 inches, it efficiently handles two-up 8 1/2 x 11-inch pages, as well as three-up 6 x 9-inch book images. The unwinder, sheeter and stacker from EMT International, Inc. deliver collated book blocks ready for binding.

"Being able to print three-up books increases job-processing speed and reduces associated running costs," Lindemann noted.

Most toner-based systems become too expensive per unit above 200 copies, and offset printing becomes too expensive per unit at less than 3,000 copies. The Truepress Jet520 is ideal for print jobs with a quantity range of 100 to 3,000 copies, according to Lindemann.

"The print queue function enables multiple jobs with the same setup to print back to back to back," Lindemann explained. "The fast job setup and ability of the Truepress Jet520 to print more jobs in less time will help us be more competitive on quantities as low as 25 copies."