Page 44 - Print21 March-April 2020

Wide Format Printing
ADS thinking big is best
with first Vutek h5 in ANZ
A strategy of proactive product development and reinvesting in the business with high quality equipment is seeing wide format outfit ADS Australia achieve nationwide success.
With less than a dozen staff, and a pair
of EFI Vutek wide format print systems, ADS Australia has achieved a nationwide customer base, gained a reputation for innovative solutions, and seen consistent growth over the almost 20 years it has been owned by Dean Wright.
For a business that, when Wright bought it in 2001, was a three-man traditional screen printing outfit serving the local Thomastown business community, it has been a journey
from analogue to digital, from local to national, from passive to active.
Wright started his print career with an apprenticeship in a flexo gravure house. After more than a decade in that field he took time
out to help in the family’s non-print business, and when that was sold, he was looking to get back into print and make his own mark in it. The opportunity to buy the local screen printing business arose, which was eagerly embraced.
After building up the business for several years Wright dipped his toe in the new digital waters, buying his first digital wide format printer, a small roll-to-roll system, then a couple of years later took the plunge and invested in at EFI Vutek, in
this case the QS2000. Wright says, “It was a major step forward. The production power of the Vutek was huge.” That first Vutek was hybrid, and every printer that Wright has invested in since then has also been hybrid. Wright says, “The flexibility is what we need, with the ability to print both board and roll. We also appreciated the small footprint that the Vutek had, space is at a premium in Melbourne.”
In the six or seven years since then ADS has invested in four more EFI Vuteks, and a pair of Esko Kongsberg cutting tables. Wright says, “My view is to be able to go to market and offer the best print I need to have the best equipment. I have always been a
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“We are not a me-too printer. Our clients look to us to provide new and engaging print, we are continually innovating to stay ahead.”
– Dean Wright, director, ADS Australia
The new h5 printer means ADS
can print up to nine layers, with eight colours plus white, for what EFI says are premium-margin graphics, such as textured prints and backlit graphics. Wright says, “ADS is always looking for what else we can bring to the market. We are not a me-too printer. Our clients look to us to provide new and engaging print, we are continually innovating.”
ADS has been a 100 per cent EFI house virtually since it made the digital move. Wright says, “The Vutek’s are fast, high quality flexible printers. They enable us to get product to market really quickly, at the quality levels clients demand. We have also enjoyed the benefits of EFI service contracts, which means the printers are well looked after and always ready to go.”
The company is also keen to
stress its environmental credentials, with the new Vutek typical of its approach. Wright says, “One of the appeals of the h5 is that it is a green printing machine. It has Greenguard certified inks, and is an LED
printer, which means that its energy requirements are a fraction of more conventional printers, and we are not going through bulbs.”
With a clear strategy of taking a proactive approach, reinvesting in the business and focusing on quality and speed it is instructive that ADS Australia is winning clients from all over the country. 21
Above
Clear strategy: Dean Wright, ADS, with the new Vutek h5
strong believer in investing as much back into the business as possible.”
Growth for ADS also came through acquisition – the company bought rival operator Bull DSP, which had its own Vutek, also a GS2000. The Mulgrave based business was consolidated into the ADS site into Thomastown.
Then at PrintEx last year Wright took the Vutek h3 that was on the show floor and upgraded it to an
h5. With the upgrade, users can get even greater speed and capacity –
up to forty-seven per cent higher productivity with top print speeds
of 109 boards an hour from the five heads per colour printheads. He took out the older printers, which left him with the LX3 and the new h5, but the move increased his production power by a whopping 30 per cent. Wright says, “It fitted our strategy of having super-productive kit, which means we can get more out the door, faster, and with less space and lower operator costs. “We have a lot of clients in the retail space for whom speed of turnaround is key, and our equipment and approach means we can make this happen.”