CITY OF INDUSTRY, Calif. (June 23, 2008) -- The Orange County Container (OCC) Group believes that the best way to make an impression is to show, not tell. The OCC Group has shown a "Whatever it Takes" attitude toward its customers' corrugated requirements ever since the company entered the brown box industrial business more than 27 years ago.

When the OCC Group made the decision to replace a veteran seven-color, 56-inch carton press, the company wasn't content to acquire a similarly configured machine. Having kept a watchful eye on developments in offset technology, the printer installed a 56-inch Mitsubishi Diamond 6000LX press that is equipped for inline aqueous and ultraviolet (UV) coating.

The Diamond 6000LX prints on 0.004-inch to 0.040-inch stock at high speed, including packaging board and synthetic substrates. The eight-color press is expected to enhance the OCC Group's already solid reputation for providing creative and cost-effective packaging solutions. It can print on the sensitive thermoplastic materials used in the creation of lenticular images. Lenticular printing is a market segment the OCC Group is developing thanks to the new press.

"We aggressively invest in the latest technological advances in equipment and software to ensure packaging excellence," said Dan Domino, vice president/general manager. "Mitsubishi has earned a reputation for manufacturing a fine printing press lineup. The Diamond 6000LX has higher running speeds and faster setups to move short-run orders through much quicker and maintain efficient production on long-run orders. The inline UV capability also is a significant advantage."

The OCC Group specializes in retail and industrial corrugated manufacturing, graphic packaging and point-of-purchase displays. With run lengths varying from 3,000 to 100,000 sheets, projects range from high-end packaging to commodity work, such as containers for household items and food products.

The company opened for business in 1981 with four employees, one rental truck and a few pieces of miscellaneous equipment. Today, approximately 2,800 people are employed by the privately owned company.

Through consistent growth and a series of strategic acquisitions, the OCC Group enjoys a high degree of vertical integration. In-house services include printing, converting, design, sheet supply, label production and fulfillment. Its divisions offer sheetfed offset, flexographic printing with UV coating, single-face laminating and label laminating.

The organization currently consists of 12 locations spanning 2.2 million square feet of space in the United States, Mexico and China. The corporate headquarters in City of Industry, Calif., occupies 279,000 square feet.

In the past several years, the OCC Group has seen especially robust growth, estimated at 20 to 25 percent annually. Sales for 2008 are projected to reach $340 million.

For the OCC Group, satisfying the printer's many clients means listening to their needs and partnering with them to devise innovative solutions. Those same qualities are sought in its vendors, according to Domino.

"One of the reasons we purchased the Mitsubishi press is the fact that Mitsubishi understood our needs," he added. "They listened to us and put together a total package. They supplied references for printers to talk to, as well as arranging visits to other printing plants to see different presses and assess their performance benefits prior to buying our own press. They are very service-oriented that way."

Noting that Mitsubishi's West Coast headquarters is located in Ontario, Calif., Domino said "another major factor in the level of service we can expect from Mitsubishi is the local parts distribution and availability of service technicians."

The Diamond 6000LX is equipped with a Peak UV and infrared drying package from Air Motion Systems Inc. Water-based applications account for about 80 percent of the OCC Group's coated sheetfed work.

In addition to aqueous and UV capabilities, the press incorporates closed-loop color control and an X-Rite spectrophotometer-powered color management system.

"We have complete color management from prepress all the way through the press," Domino pointed out. "The X-Rite system automatically scans color control bars and makes adjustments to the press as it is running. Setups are much faster as a result. We have better control over color, so there is less material waste."

The primary advantage of the running speed and automation of the Diamond 6000LX is that press operators can produce more work in less time.

"We can complete more jobs in a day on this press than we could have probably run on our best day with the previous machine," Domino said. "We can do six or seven jobs in two shifts depending on the run lengths. The press has given us what we needed."