Apprintable celebrates 10 years with milestone
Apprintable is celebrating a milestone investment as it celebrates its tenth year in business
Monday, 22 Apr 2024 10:56 GMT
[L to R] Peter Haddad, managing director and Stephen Pho, production manager of Apprintable
Celebrating ten years in business today, Apprintable has made a milestone six-figure investment.
Apprintable produces a wide range of products for direct clients mainly in the drinks, events, hospitality, and nightlife industries.
The company also produces business cards, flyers, and posters through its website with its specialties including Tyvek wristbands, paper cup sleeves, and other die-cut products such as hotel key card wallets and kiss-cut stickers.
Based in Wembley, London, Apprintable produces a lot of same-day work and is well positioned to turn work around and deliver quickly across the city.
Bringing Work In-house
Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, Apprintable was outsourcing 100% of its work and managing director Peter Haddad describes this period as “the real driver” for the company in its recent growth period.
Making use of the Government Bounceback Loan, Haddad decided, rather than using it to manage cash flow, to invest in equipment. “This allowed us to massively increase our margins and continue to invest in our own equipment,” he explains.
“With more and more people going online, particularly since 2020, we were already positioned quite well with our existing website and have continued to develop it and to develop products to help us stand out.”
As a result, the company has gone from around £300-400k in revenue pre-Covid with a very low margin, to just over £1m in the 2023/24 financial year.
Significant Investment
Since the Covid-19 pandemic, Apprintable has invested in a range of hardware including a wide-format Mimaki CJV330-160 eco-solvent printer with X/Y cutting and an Epson SureColor 2100 direct-to-garment printer.
In terms of finishing equipment, Apprintable has invested in a Morgana Pro 450 laminator with feeder, a Morgana BM4050 bookletmaker, an Aerocut Prime auto cutter/slitter/creaser/perforater, an Ideal 56 guillotine, and a Vivid Laminating Technologies Veloblade Volta 64+.
For sheet-fed toner printing, Apprintable has invested in a Ricoh Pro C5300 and a Xerox Versant 280. Most recently, the company has just made a significant investment into a Ricoh Pro C9500 with the press now up and running.
The investment in the Ricoh Pro C9500 from ASL marks a significant milestone for Apprintable as the first six-figure upgrade investment
“This is a huge milestone for us having only just had our first proper ‘lite production press’ in the Xerox Versant 280 installed in August 2022 and is our first six-figure spend on an upgrade,” Haddad says.
Having installed a Ricoh Pro C9100 temporarily to get the company through the winter period, Haddad explains that once finance was secured on the 9500, it was a quick and easy switchover.
“It was an easy decision as it was largely based on capacity and reliability. We would hit our ceiling fairly quickly due to our continued growth trajectory by the end of this year on anything else.”
A Seamless Process
Haddad has praised Ricoh during the installation process and gave a particular mention to engineers Brian McBean and Richard Parrot who turned the install around in just one day rather than three.
Apprintable has invested in this new technology through its relationship with ASL and Haddad describes the company as “a natural partner for us”, praising their care and understanding of the business and its direction.
Having gone from outsourcing 100% of work pre-pandemic to running over 15 pieces of kit in-house and achieving over £1m in the 2023/24 fiancial year, it’s an exciting future for Apprintable as it celebrates a decade in business.
If you have any news, please email carys@linkpublishing.co.uk or join in with the conversation on Twitter and LinkedIn.
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