PERFORMA

Argraf is a small Warsaw printshop located in the ground floor of a building on the banks of the Visla River. The printshop employs 18 people of which 12 work in production. The company built their position and name on the local market mainly due to orders from the printing of books and magazines which deal with historical topics. The increasing demands from clients pushed the company management into purchasing a new KBA Performa 74 press from the Dobruška factory.

The decision regarding the new investment was made by the company chairman and owner, Mr Tomasz Dukielski. Unfortunately he did not have the time to enjoy the newly purchased press; he died in November 2006. The printshop is currently under the management of his wife, Kristýna Dukielská. Argraf has been operating on the market since 1 March 1990. During the early years, the main activity of the printshop was the exchange service of the graphic art market where they searched for a suitable printshop on behalf of their clients for processing given orders. The company launched their printshop activities in 1995 while implementing their experience from the publishing market and the growing demand for the cheap printing of low issue volumes of books and magazines.

Andrzej Malejko, printshop Argraf

The printshop purchased as their first press the single colour Romayor in the SRB3 format. "We used it to print all the colour orders” said Andrzej Malejko, “but soon it could not meet our requirements. We installed another Romayor six months later and purchased a paper cutter which allowed us to launch the bookbinding workshop. The work which we used to contract out to another printshop for pre-press preparation has been directly carried out in our premises with the help of our own Polygraph machine since 1996. At the end of the decade, we also purchased for our printshop the following technology: Single-colour Dominant 715 in the SRA2 format, two-colour Polly 266 (SRA2 format), which was replaced shortly after with a four-colour Polly 466 (in the same format)”. After the last purchase, the investment into printing presses was stopped for several years while the development focused on the pre-press department. The department received a CtP Presstek Dimension Excel 425 exposition machine for chemical free processing of Anthem Pro printing plates (Andrzej Malejko said: “We use it for the exposition of 1200 printing plates per month in the SRA2 and SRB2 formats as well as in the book binding workshop which currently holds the folding machine, the line for seamless and seamed binding and the paper cutter. The printshop also has its own graphic studio which makes it almost independent; only the hard cover binding is contracted to external suppliers”.

“From the start of our printing activity, we have been involved in the printing of books and publications, especially those with a history and education subject", said Andrzej Malejko. At the beginning, these were just humble jobs which could have been done with the help of a single-colour press. After the purchase of the Polly 266, more significant customers as well as orders for the printing of album publications started to arrive. It is the Argraf printshop to which the Royal Chateau from Warsaw submits their orders for their albums honouring the anniversaries of historical exhibitions. The order portfolio started to expand and after the contracts from the Royal Chateau, the others such as the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Historical Museum of the Capital City of Warsaw, the Warsaw Museum of Independence and the Palace in Vilanov have also followed. They required the printing of historical books and exclusive albums in small editions (the orders did not exceed 1000 issues), however they were in a large volume. The printshop can also offer a refined press, so called laminating and varnishing using a screen printing process which is provided by the nearby bookbinding workshop.

“It is easy to operate, an intuitive press which does not cause any problems to a good professional printer," said Andrzej Malejko

The company also entered the magazine market after winning a tender (in addition to others, for printing of the monthly issue of "Spotkania z Zabytkami" in the volume of 8000 copies as well as the social and cultural monthly issue of "Midrasz" magazine - 2,500 copies and furthermore, one of the Polish energy network magazines, the "Biuletyn Miesięczny”, “Elektroenergetyka”, “Fakty Dokumenty”). The Centre of Modern Art from Warsaw and the Fibaka Gallery use the Argraf for the printing of their albums. Each month approximately 14,000 books and albums leave the printshop, among them soft, hard and seamed bindings create approximately 30 percent of the production. The remaining part which does not exceed 10% consists of advertising leaflets, calendars, promotional material, company jobs and odd jobs.

The growing print ratio of the publications resulted in Tomasz Dukielsky developing the production potential of the printshop. He decided to purchase another printing press, this time in the SRB2 format (Andrzej Malejko stated: “We print many books in the SRB5 format; printing in SRB3 on machines in the SRA2 format became unprofitable as it required the exposition of a double number of printing plates and the entire process in general was more elaborate)”. The new printing press should increase the printshop options and cut down the order processing times.

“We turned down the idea to invest into a used reconditioned press very quickly”. We have decided that concerning the complicated electronics nowadays installed in the presses, it would be better to purchase a new press (to avoid any faults appearing) even if it has less options than a reconditioned press. The boss has been checking the offers available on the market, and besides others the Printmastr Heidelberg and Roland 200”, said Andrzej Malejko. “He chose the Performa 74 as he appreciated the price and the components offered by the Czech manufacturer (the press from Dobruška includes, in addition to others, the perfector 2+2, the diagonal adjustment of printing plate, CIP-4 system”. The compact size of the machine was also important as it allows for easy positioning in not very large areas as well as the close distance of the production company which guarantees easy contact with the service if any problems will occur. He also added another reason for their choice of purchase: “After the take over of Grafitec by the KBA syndicate, Dobruška experienced significant and positive changes. The factory made a big investment into machining parts and the work became more precise. This is apparent; the Performa has been operating for three quarters of a year without any problems with quality, proofing or lines.

The equipment purchased by Argraf on leasing is a four-colour press in the SRB2 format with a perfector behind a second printing unit (press 4+0 or 2+2)

The Performa arrived before Christmas 2006, and was fully launched within seven days although the production of the first orders was launched in just four days. Only one day of training was needed for the printers from Argraf to familiarize themselves with the basic operation tasks. “It is easy to operate, an intuitive press which does not cause any problems to a good professional printer," said Andrzej Malejko. The equipment purchased by Argraf on leasing is a four-colour press in the SRB2 format with a perfector behind a second printing unit (press 4+0 or 2+2). The qualities which guarantee a high performance include the semi-automatic replacement of printing plates within less than 60 seconds for a single printing unit, the remote control setting of the registers (including diagonal registers) and the infrared drying unit upon delivery, automatic ink roller and offset blanket washers, the pre-set of CIP4 for remote control of the ink rollers and a speed of up to 13,000 sheets an hour.

“We can already say today that the choice of the Performa was the right one. The Dobruška product is doing well on the market where the customer demands quality and quick order processing for a fair, i.e. low price. The promises of the KBA-Grafitec sales representatives have been confirmed as the press performs as advised. We use it almost non-stop during a two shift operation”, before finishing with the final words: “If we had to make another decision, we would agree on the same one”.