There are very few days in Aussie printers’ calendars which bring the presses to a grinding halt, and one of them is the Melbourne Cup. 

Printers across the country enjoyed the day with extra-long lunches and work sweeps to be had, however only Victorians managed to score a public holiday on Tuesday, with many Victorian printers turning it into a four-day weekend.

Braeside printer Conlay Press was one of the few businesses open the day before Melbourne Cup, which many Victorians turned into an unofficial public holiday.

“We took the public holiday on the actual day of Melbourne Cup and had no shifts running,” assisting general manager Peta Isaacs says.

“We worked the Monday and found out none of our suppliers were working the Monday, let alone the Tuesday.”

Director of Print Intelligence in South Melbourne, Rick Dakin says the decision to close the shop on Melbourne Cup depends on the workload during the days prior.

“We were essentially closed,” he says. “I found a lot of people were shut on the Monday also and turned it into an extra-long weekend.”

Maryborough printer Centre State Printing was one of the few businesses which ran shifts during Melbourne Cup day.

“For us it was business as usual,” director Rick Dawson explains. “Our normal day shift finishes at 3pm so we did wind up a bit early to watch the race.

“It depends on what work we have on Melbourne Cup, we had a big work load that day so we decided to stay open.”

Allkotes has offices in both Melbourne and Sydney, and although business development manager Darren Delaney was stuck in the Sydney office, his day was sweetened by scoring second place in the Allkotes sweeps.

“Melbourne Cup does slow down business for a couple of days and it definitely still has an influence over the Sydney market,” he says.

“The Melbourne office gained some extra work because of the race, they would have produced a whole host of invitations, some programs, booklets and VIP passes specifically for the event.”

Seven's coverage of the 2016 Melbourne Cup – which saw Almandin and jockey Kerrin McEvoy score a record fifth win for owner Lloyd Williams saw audience numbers decline compared to last year’s display.

An average metro audience of 1.986 million paused their boozing and betting to watch the race, down from the 2.068 million viewers garnered in 2015.

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