It’s been an exciting few weeks at the Design Xpress site in Consett, Country Durham. Not only has Perfect Colours supplied the UK’s first Inktec Jetrix LXi7, but they’ve also taken delivery of one of Canon’s cutting-edge Océ Colorado 1650s. This is all part of an aggressive new growth strategy which has been supported by the County Durham Growth Fund with a £50k grant towards the £195k investment.
Design Xpress was launched by Juliette Brown nearly 25 years ago and as it enters the new decade, the company’s going from strength to strength. With this latest investment injection, the aim is to achieve a £1.5m turnover within the next three years, providing the opportunity to create several new jobs. It delivers large format print for design agencies, print management companies, retail brands, government bodies and the NHS.
The decision to invest in a Jetrix LXi7 and a Colorado was taken after careful consideration. It was based on the speed, output quality, flexibility and economical running costs of both printers. According to operations director Carl Gerry it was time for a change: “We’ve always had a different brand of flatbeds, but we wanted to upgrade and went out into the market to have a look. We’d not even heard of Jetrix about 18 months ago, but Perfect Colours, who we always buy our printers through, are a reseller for this make, so we considered all our options.”
The deciding factor was that “the Jetrix ink costs are massively cheaper,” says Carl. “We went to the Perfect Colours demo suite in Sheffield and finally decided to go with the LXi7 based on cost, flexibility and speed compared to our old hybrids.”
This will be the first time Design Xpress has had white ink – with their old machines, it wasn’t worth having unless you ran it all the time. It’s not the same with the LXi7, which also gives them the ability to do things for the retail sector such as acrylics and two-sided window vinyl – and the jobs are already starting to come in. “The support from Jetrix and Inktec has been amazing – they sent two of their top engineers over from Korea to install it for us.”
Perfect Colours was also responsible for supplying the Canon Océ Colorado 1650. This high-speed printer will be particularly useful for creating pull-up banners for pop-up systems. “The new Colorado gives us the opportunity to print matt, as well as glossy. It’s great for roll-fed and will help us meet the huge demand we have for pull-ups, which are a core product,” says Carl.
“We need to keep investing in equipment, systems and our workforce to stay competitive,” he continues. “We’ve been through some difficult times over the years, but we have achieved significant growth in the past five years and we’re very proud of the business and service levels we offer. With the new printers installed, we’re now in an excellent position to concentrate on growth.”
For more information on either the Inktec Jetrix LXi7 or the Canon Océ Colorado, talk to the sales team at Perfect Colours on 0845 680 9000.
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