Faret s.a. gets accurate color and reduces press passes with GMG OpenColor

Hingham, MA USA – By installing GMG OpenColor, Faret s.a. has accurately helped to represent spot colors from process inks, reducing the number of spot colors required on press, cutting down on press runs, and saving prepress time.

Faret s.a was founded in 1986 and has been recognized for excellence in packaging production and customer service. The family-owned business began by printing pharmaceutical folding-carton packages—still the company’s core business 25 years later. All production steps are managed by Faret’s integral Certified Quality and Environmental system—they are ISO 9001: 2008 and ISO 14001 and PEFC Certified. “We are highly committed to innovation through technology and the continuous improvement of our workflow,” comments Andres Faret, Gerente Comercial, Faret s.a. “We have a wide range of state of the art machinery for different types of applications in order to fulfill the highest quality standards.”

Through the 1980s, Faret primarily printed with spot colors, and were well known for their exceptional work preparing inks for Pantone colors. In the 1990s, they expanded their business to include cosmetics and health care packaging, which required CMYK inks for images, along with spot colors for the brands. “For more than 20 years we have supplied the best packaging solutions and the most innovative high end finishes for folding cartons of the health care and beauty companies in Chile,” says Faret. “We developed this niche by producing high-end folding cartons with functional properties. However, prepress became very difficult. Our customers would deliver photos. We would work with profiles and go to press, and cross our fingers that the colors would match.”

From the mid 2000s, Faret again expanded its business, printing folded cartons for wines, liquors and spirits. To support these, they invested in color management software. “With process color you have to update profiles every two to three months. Sometimes the machinery changes a little bit or, if you change inks or blankets, there is some impact. You will have deviations,” comments Faret. While they worked with the software for two to three years, there was no local service. In 2009, Faret researched the market and found GMG. Faret invested in GMG ColorProof, GMG ColorServer and GMG InkOptimizer and had GMG profile the system. “We RIPped a file, and it was fantastic,” notes Faret.

About a year ago, GMG used Faret as a beta site for GMG OpenColor—the first installation in Latin America. Faret wanted OpenColor to predict spot color results on a press. “Sometimes, the folding cartons we print use spot colors sparingly; for example, tiny areas of text. To be cost effective, we gang print our customers’ work, but we were ending up with 18-24 spot colors on one sheet,” explains Faret. “Our largest press is a six-color press, which means that we had to pass the job four times through the press. With OpenColor, we figured we could combine the basic colors in the sheet and mathematically reduce the number of colors from 24 to 12—which means we would need only two passes, rather than four.”

Faret’s first customer reaction was ‘Are you sure that you can achieve the same colors and tones?’ Faret printed a Hexachrome color chart with CMYK and green, orange and violet. They showed the chart to their customers, and all were impressed, saying, ‘OK, go ahead!’ “We have two large pharmaceutical customers. They require packaging for many different, extensive product lines and they have different spot colors for each line. In their color libraries they have more than a hundred Pantone colors,” remarks Faret. “We gang print their jobs with only two passes—and, it’s easy to do.”

When Faret passes a sheet four times through a press, it can stretch the sheet, which is not good for diecutting. “Now, with two passes, it is easier. We’re reducing the print time and cost—and the prepress processes are easier. We do not have to make huge adjustments or spend more setup time on the diecutter. We are able to pass the economies to customer,” adds Faret.

Faret also has a five-color digital press. The fifth station is used for a spot color. They use OpenColor to manage these jobs as well.

“In our prepress department, we now approach each job more efficiently. We typically produce 12-14 new jobs—not re-runs—per day. Two people work solely with color management, and we have one more person in prepress with press experience. They do not have to experiment to match colors. They see the proof, set the colors, and it’s done. “We were surprised when we could combine our spot colors with each other,” says Faret. “And, we have increased prepress productivity 30%. On the press, we have saved 20-25% of press time, because we have less passes and have also reduced setup downtime and makeready time.”

“OpenColor is the most flexible and reliable solution we have in our prepress department. When it was installed we learned very quickly that we needed it. We print so many spot colors on one sheet and now we can see the results before going to press,” concludes Faret. “And GMG, together with their dealer Davisgraphics, have done a good job supporting us here, in Chile.”