Sydney firm Cliff Lewis Printing has celebrated its 40th birthday by moving into a new factory and installing a new digital production printer.
General manager Adam Lewis says with rapid business growth in the past two years to $5m turnover, the company had outgrown the Taren Point site it had called home for 20 years.
“We bought Jarvis Printing in 2013 which added a lot of business and more recently have doubled our digital business last year and grown our offset by 30 per cent, so we were running out of room and power,” he says.
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While the new 1400sqm facility is bigger it is also in one place rather than spread out across two neighbouring buildings totalling 900sqm, making the new site far more efficient.
It is also the first building the business has owned, having rented five others over the life of the company, but Lewis says the $2m buying price plus fit out was worth it.
“Life is much easier now and we are making money back from efficiency already. It is easier to move stock around, the workflow is simpler, and work is done faster so the staff and I are smiling,” he says.
Lewis says the move taught him and his brother Matthew, who he has run the business with since their father Cliff handed it over 15 years ago, to delegate more and rely on their staff.
“The move was a mammoth task and I have been focused on it for the past six months and not really had time to work in the business, so it’s been a great test to leave it to the managers,” he says.
Owning the building also means the company can install solar panels on the roof, with power being a consistent limiting factor of previous building as the company grew.
The move has also seen a digital kit upgrade with a new Fuji Xerox Versant 2100 replacing a black and white machine and new offset on the horizon.
“Runs are getting shorter and we have been struggling to keep up with demand so this will help take the pressure off and move short run offset work like business cards and weekly real estate brochures to digital,” he says.
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He says the digital operation is about 15-20 per cent of turnover but is growing rapidly, and three new staff, an apprentice, a guillotine operator and a junior salesman, will join the 30-staff firm.
“We almost bought a new offset press instead but we thought with the move it would be too much at once and then Fuji Xerox made us a good offer,” Lewis says.
“The technology we have been waiting for in offset has arrived and while Matthew and I argue about it, the press will be some kind of 10 colour with UV and be bought in the next year or so.
“Turnaround times are getting so short that we need that instant-dry UV capability to keep up as on-demand printing and just turning over work fast is what gets our margins where they need to be.”
Lewis says the company wants to stay in the A2 market, rather than buy an A1 press, as it is a good niche for it.
The company, which started in a shed in 1975, now runs two Heidelberg Speedmasters, a four-colour and a two-colour, a Komori Lithrone 28 five colour, and Fuji Xerox Color 800 digital printer along with the new Versant.
The business was an early adopter of web-to-print, creating its own system 15 years ago before its MIS provider developed its own.
Cliff Lewis Printing held a birthday bash for staff and clients last week, including former Australian Idol contestant Shannon Noll, where the Lewis family cut a birthday cake and toasted to another 40 years.
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