Print on Demand specialist CPI Antony Rowe has purchased a Watkiss PowerSquare book maker, to add to its already extensive range of finishing equipment.

Anthony Rowe is acknowledged as the UK's premier manufacturer of on-demand books.  The company prints for a wide variety of specialist publishers - from legal and scientific to technical and historic - producing books, journals, dictionaries, directories, yearbooks, reference books, indexes, guidebooks, legal books and looseleaf publications.

The company has two specialised factories, one in Chippenham for short-run printing, the other in Eastbourne where the Print on Demand operation is based.

General Manager, Martin Collyer, specified the Watkiss PowerSquare for the Eastbourne factory because it is an all-in-one solution.  "We did a lot of research before purchasing the PowerSquare, and it ticked all the boxes.  It was a good price, it's very flexible, exceptionally quick to set up and the finished product was, in our opinion, the best by far on the market.  In particular we liked the square spine it produces, which is preferable to the normal curved spine on other products."

The innovative Watkiss PowerSquare 200 is a complete book making system that stitches, folds, forms a SquareBack spine and trims the pages to size in one pass.  With a maximum book thickness of 10mm, the PowerSquare has double the capacity of alternative booklet makers.  It features automatic setting for different book size and pagination, including variable stitch leg length for varying book thickness. It is available in online and offline versions, according to customer preference.

Collyer chose an offline PowerSquare because it is best suited to their ultra low run lengths.  "There is no such thing as a typical job. We pride ourselves on printing on any digitally compatible stock that the customer specifies and we frequently print just a single copy of a book – in fact our average run length is just 1.7 books."

Since purchasing the PowerSquare, it has been instrumental in securing a contract that demanded a square-spined, saddle stitched finish.  "Although we didn't purchase the PowerSquare for any particular contract, it has already helped us win additional work" comments Collyer.