PrintFactory powers the Bernard Group's exponential growth

PRINTFACTORY POWERS THE BERNARD GROUP’S EXPONENTIAL GROWTH

PrintFactory software - utilizing GMG’s complete package of productivity and color management tools - has supported leading visual merchandising company, The Bernard Group, during a period of unprecedented growth.

A ‘trusted partner’ to the visual merchandising expert, the software has allowed the company to increase its job volume by 250% - while only increasing prepress and production staff by 20%.

Alan Stratton, The Bernard Group’s color manager, said: “Retail brands are very demanding on both color and turnaround times and PrintFactory has allowed us to keep up with our growth. They not only have delivered a great product but have proven themselves a trusted partner in the process.”

Background:

Based just outside of Minneapolis, The Bernard Group is a visual merchandizing company serving the needs of some of the most prestigious retailers and franchises in the industry.

Prior to installing the PrintFactory platform, the company standardized on RIP systems from one vendor that each drove one of the printers on the floor, each with their own color management. It required three full-time color management experts to create up to date profiles. For each substrate and each device, profiles needed to be made from scratch and made again when colors drifted. The company had 21 digital presses on the floor and had to spend three hours per printer and substrate making profiles, amounting to a lot of lost man hours.

Ensuring consistency and accuracy was also an issue. The company wanted to match and maintain color better across its machines, ink sets, and media. It also wanted a way to verify color once the profile was made, and the tools to fine-tune it to make it more accurate and faster to correct.

The PrintFactory solution:

With these issues in mind, it was the complete package of productivity tools and color management that attracted The Bernard Group to PrintFactory.

"The software offered a fast and easy way to step and repeat graphics automatically. It can automate files for print and send digital cutting instructions to our die cutting machines. It also removes the waiting time for people trying to RIP files to the same devices simultaneously,” explained Stratton.

Furthermore, the initial training, set up and continuing support from PrintFactory’s U.S. distributor, GMG Americas, helped to overcome any staff resistance to the change. Highlighting the benefits of the new software, PrintFactory ran alongside the previous provider for six weeks. They found that only 0.8% of problems were from software issues, which were reported and fixed within a month.

Improved color accuracy and productivity:

Explaining the color and productivity benefits, Stratton said: “It is generally difficult to make color management work in a busy environment like wide format production but this software means we can now easily correct a color drift on the printers by a simple recalibration.

“With our previous RIP system we could never get printers to match this closely. We have reduced the time it takes to make all seven printers match perfectly from 63 to 18 hours, a reduction of more than 70%.

"The way the PrintFactory workflow works is also much faster and efficient. Before, about 10% of the files Bernard processes needed correction. On average, it would take up to four hours before print production could start, and the machine was usually idle for up to three hours. Those idle hours are very expensive. The new software has reduced the need for retouching a file by more than 90%, with less than 1% of jobs needing correction.

“The presses rarely stand still - we have almost tripled our sales numbers and we lean heavily on PrintFactory, powered by GMG, to keep up with our growth.”

To find out more about PrintFactory’s software solutions visit Booth 263 or www.printfactory.cloud.

www.thebernardgroup.com

-ENDS-

Notes to Editors:

PrintFactory has been finding ways to improve the large format print process since 2001. Determined to free the LFP sector of the unnecessary complexities that continue to impact on cost, consistency and capacity on the production floor, PrintFactory has completely re-engineered the wide-format workflow to equip the world’s print shops with an intuitive and future-proofed platform that resolves these issues and readies them for the industry 4.0 era.

The IP-rich, research focused development team has brought its complete proofing solutions to market under many guises. Synonymous with an acclaimed portfolio of time and resource saving products, including GMG’s ProductionSuite and ProofMaster platforms, PrintFactory – with its celebrated software of the same name – has now set up as an entity in its own right to focus on developing its cloud-based automation tools that can be directly integrated into existing MIS/workflow systems.

For further information visit www.printfactory.cloud

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