According to the Australian Financial Review, the Coles food and liquor business, which is owned by Wesfarmers, spends an estimated $30m a year printing catalogues and $20m a year distributing them.

The Coles contracts were at the centre of a PMP controversy this year, including claims that the print giant was selling undelivered catalogues to paper recyclers. PMP allegedly overcharged Coles by about $8m in 2007-08 and the retailer hired private investigators to watch PMP’s catalogue distribution centres.

Early this year, Coles moved its catalogue distribution contracts from PMP to Salmat. It also moved the majority of its catalogue printing work from PMP to AIW Printing, Franklin Press and Michael Hannan’s IPMG.

Richard Allely, chief executive of PMP confirms the company has tendered for the new Coles contracts however the retailer has not given a timframe for selecting its preferred suppliers, the AFR reports.

Allely adds that retailers often spend up to three months reviewing tenders for catalogue printing and distribution contracts.

Competition in heatset is intense, with IPMG, Blue Star, AIW, Franklin, IPMG and Cadillac all targeting PMP customers, especially in the catalogue market.

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