KENNESAW, Ga. – August 26, 2004 – Benton Bindery, a well-established trade binding shop that has been in business since 1973, recently installed several new pieces of Heidelberg equipment, including two ST 270 saddlestitchers and a miniature Stahlfolder Ti 55 folder, to improve output and meet tighter customer deadlines. Based in Carlstead, N.J., Benton completed the installation and training earlier this year as part of the company’s continued strategy of routinely updating its equipment with the latest in finishing technology to help it stay ahead of its competition and to prepare for the future. Thanks to the new installation of Heidelberg equipment, Benton has hired four new workers and increased the shop’s size more than 15,000 square feet. At first, a single ST 270 was installed and after only a few weeks of operation, Benton placed the order for a second stitcher to run along side to further improve the shop’s capabilities. Since the installations in February, the company has improved its overall product output and increased sales by more than 160 percent. “We’re bringing in more work than ever before and the Heidelberg machines have been running nonstop six days a week and we don’t have to worry about problems once the job is set,” said Phil Engel, owner of Benton Bindery. “It’s great having equipment in the shop that we can just set up and forget about. We’re producing hundreds of thousands of books a week and so there is lots of other work that my employees can focus their time on.” Benton is using the new Heidelberg equipment to produce a wide array of materials, including books, magazines, binders, brochures, pamphlets, medical inserts and countless other documents that need finishing, for large commercial printers, small conventional shops, digital printers, warehouses and retail shops. The shop primarily works on binding, stitching, gluing, folding, packing and shipping finished jobs for its customers all around the country. Since the installation, the company is now able to produce small inserts found in many prescription bottles on the Ti 55 for the first time. Heidelberg's ergonomically designed saddle stitcher, Stitchmaster ST 270, is manufactured to run a highly diverse range of products and substrates. Speed range is up to 11,500 cycles per hour. In today's changing Postpress environment where run lengths are shorter and customer demand for quicker turn arounds has increased, Heidelberg is setting the standard and has taken the approach to design equipment that can be easily prepared and made readied to insure that the Postpress production deadline demands are achieved. Tools have been replaced with Kip handles, operational adjustments have been redesigned with pre-calibrated Festa quick change over settings and external on the fly adjustments with numerical read out scales expedite the set-up procedure. The miniature Stahlfolder Ti 55 buckle plate folder is Heidelberg’s small, yet highly economical folder with continues feeder. This high productive folder is the ideal folder for specialized and unique applications that require small folds on small sheets. The unit folds personalized print sheets or continuous paper quickly and inexpensively, without any need for intermediate stacking or new feed. The user thus benefits from an innovative solution that enables him to offer services such as direct mailshots or print-on-demand. With the new equipment, Engel said Benton is able to provide higher quality and a greater range of services in shorter amounts of time because of the quality and speed innovations made to the ST 270 and Ti 55 recently. Engel said he expects the new technology will enable the company to offer more new products and longer run lengths because of the performance it already is getting from the systems. Makeready has been dramatically reduced and the computers on both systems have user-friendly set-ups that make it easier to meet tighter deadlines. In addition to higher sales, Benton Bindery has seen overall productivity improve dramatically since the new Heidelberg equipment was installed. “Both the ST 270 and Ti 55 are competitively priced and came equipped with more features than anything else on the market,” Engel said. “Since the installation we’ve taken on additional capacity and can add more shifts if the need arises. It is my philosophy that if I tell a customer I will have a job ready for them at a certain time, that job will be ready. Heidelberg takes that into account when it makes it machines too because it continues to build fast, yet reliable equipment that is helping trade binders like myself succeed.”