Zoom Print by Print Mart installs an MGI JetVarnish 3DS

Konica Minolta helps in augmenting the production capacity

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Zoom Print by Print Mart
Atul and Vikas Bhatt of Print Mart with Konica Minolta team standing in front of the newly installed MGI JetVarnish 3DS at Pitam Pura, Delhi. Photo IPP

The resumption of digital press installations on a weekly if not daily basis indicates the return of commercial printing and the need to build up capacities. Although the per-page cost of digital print remains higher than offset print, it continues to grow for short runs and increasingly encroaches into slightly higher quantities especially for book printing as the economy opens up.

Zoom Print by Print Mart has installed its third digital machine from Konica Minolta India,  an MGI JetVarnish 3DS in March 2022. In our recent visit to its Pitam Pura branch in New Delhi, the Konica Minolta and Print Mart teams gave us a tour of the plant and briefed us about their recently purchased machines.

Print Mart has a total of 27 outlets across Delhi, Ghaziabad, Faridabad in the Delhi NCR and in other cities further away such as Moradabad and Jalandhar. Its monthly print production capacity is approximately 44 lakh (4.4 million) A4 pages. Most of this print capacity is in full color, and with capabilities in several plants to add special accent colors such as pink, white, gold, and silver. Its monochrome capacity of 20 lakh (or 2 million) A4 pages has been added in the past year.

The MGI JetVarnish 3DS has augmented the digital print and embellishment or enhancement capacity of Print Mart. It can spot coat prints, highlight defined areas and add 3D effects. The digital varnish technology is suited for a wide range of applications, from books to business cards, high-end invitation cards, packaging, point of sale (POS) material and other print products. The machine also includes a full-page scanner.

Vikas Bhatt, director and partner of Print Mart, remarks, “We at Print Mart print on all media, for example, wedding cards, business cards, books, catalogs, and monocartons for cosmetics, food, spices, and health brands. Everything can be printed at Print Mart. Our machines can print on paper and paperboard from 57 to 400 gsm. We have experience with 70 gsm paper and have not yet tried 57 gsm.

Bhatt says, the primary purpose of buying a new machine is to boost the production capacity and maintain or enhance the product mix. He added that since his company’s clicks on its machines are high, it adds new machines both to maintain quality and to offer print quality that is better than others. The added value of print enhancements and special effects using the MGI helps it to differentiate its imaging services further from other print service providers.

2023 promises an interesting ride for print in India

Indian Printer and Publisher founded in 1979 is the oldest B2B trade publication in the multi-platform and multi-channel IPPGroup. While the print and packaging industries have been resilient in the past 33 months since the pandemic lockdown of 25 March 2020, the commercial printing and newspaper industries have yet to recover their pre-Covid trajectory.

The fragmented commercial printing industry faces substantial challenges as does the newspaper industry. While digital short-run printing and the signage industry seem to be recovering a bit faster, ultimately their growth will also be moderated by the progress of the overall economy. On the other hand book printing exports are doing well but they too face several supply-chain and logistics challenges.

The price of publication papers including newsprint has been high in the past year while availability is diminished by several mills shutting down their publication paper and newsprint machines in the past four years. Indian paper mills are also exporting many types of paper and have raised prices for Indian printers. To some extent, this has helped in the recovery of the digital printing industry with its on-demand short-run and low-wastage paradigm.

Ultimately digital print and other digital channels will help print grow in a country where we are still far behind in our paper and print consumption and where digital is a leapfrog technology that will only increase the demand for print in the foreseeable future. For instance, there is no alternative to a rise in textbook consumption but this segment will only reach normality in the next financial year beginning on 1 April 2023.

Thus while the new normal is a moving target and many commercial printers look to diversification, we believe that our target audiences may shift and change. Like them, we will also have to adapt with agility to keep up with their business and technical information needs.

Our 2023 media kit is ready, and it is the right time to take stock and reconnect with your potential markets and customers. Print is the glue for the growth of liberal education, new industry, and an emerging economy. We seek your participation in what promises to be an interesting ride.

– Naresh Khanna

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