Worth Higgins & Associates, headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, is the state's largest commercial sheetfed printer. The core technologies of the company include offset, digital, wide-format and letterpress printing, with a pressroom that keeps two 40-inch Komori presses, a 28-inch six-color Komori press and a 29-inch four-color Komori press quite busy. Additionally, Worth Higgins & Associates is a full service operation, offering a host of capabilities that include on-demand print, web-to-print systems, custom finishing, fulfillment, warehousing and mailing options.
Known for the variety, quality and sophistication of its work, the printer's client base encompasses organizations of all sizes in the financial services, government, education, ad agency and business-to-business corporate fields.

Taking digital capabilities to a new level

Recently, Worth Higgins and Associates became an early adopter of the new Komori Impremia IS29, a first-of-its-kind 29-inch inkjet sheetfed UV printing system. The company chose the system to expand its ability to economically meet increased demand for variable data, short-run, high quality color printing on a sheet size not feasible on its other equipment. "Before acquiring this machine, the space we were able to play in digitally was limited to an 11" x 17" (279 x 432 mm) plus bleed sheet," says Scott Hudson, director of corporate communications for Worth Higgins & Associates. "We were getting requests for unique applications that we weren't able to produce on the digital presses that we had on our floor."
The Impremia IS29 offers two features that the team at Worth Higgins & Associates appreciated immediately. First, it can handle a 23" x 29" (584 x 737 mm) sheet, giving the company a larger print area of 22" x 28" (559 x 711 mm). Second, it doesn't require any special substrates or special coatings on the paper. Other digital presses require a special coating on the paper to make the ink adhere to it. With the Impremia IS29, the company can run virtually any off-the-shelf paper without worrying about the expense of buying special papers that will accept the ink.

Saying yes to innovative applications

While there are other digital presses on the market with larger sheet capabilities, the fact that the system incorporated UV curing was another feature that set this printing system apart for the company. "We were bidding on a project for one of our customers to print all of the parking placards that employees hang in their car windows. The work required printing variable data on two sides of a plastic sheet," says Mr. Hudson. "As we were testing that application using a traditional digital press that didn't have UV curing, we realized we would have issues with the ink because the ink wouldn't adhere as readily to the plastic and would fade more quickly in the sunlight. Having the UV curing capability was extremely important for us to be able to win the contract and successfully produce those placards. This was just one example of the way we could expand our business. We also knew there would be plenty of other work out there that we could capture by having the Impremia IS29 at our facility."
Another benefit that Worth Higgins & Associates is seeing directly in the pressroom with the machine's larger sheet size is that it can run jobs six-up, increasing throughput. This is especially important to the pressroom manager, who often works on stringent deadlines. "We produce postcards with variable data and personalized maps for a medical center," says Butch Kelly, pressroom manager for Worth Higgins & Associates. "The medical center mails them to residents to notify them when a new clinic or office opens in their area. I am thrilled that we now produce these three times faster with the Impremia IS29 due to the larger sheet size."
Four metropolitan areas are particularly important sources of business for Worth Higgins & Associates — Washington, DC, and Richmond, Charlottesville and Norfolk/Virginia Beach in Virginia. To market its new capabilities with the Impremia IS29, the company created a pocket folder for each of those locations that included a series of insert sheets providing the technical specifications and ideal applications for the press. The folders also included four photographs of a well-known landscape from each city printed on gloss coated, dull coated, uncoated and a textured white cover stock. The company's sales reps add any additional samples to the pocket folder that they think will resonate with particular customers.
"For each of those locations, we also printed a beautiful poster of the local landscape to showcase the maximum sheet size and image area — with our logo and Komori's logo in a white border. The image was sized to fit in a standard poster frame so that our customers could frame it if they wanted to do so," says Hudson. "They're great marketing pieces that show the quality output of this press — and the customers love them."

An economical solution for customized short runs

Worth Higgins & Associates' customers began asking for personalized short run pocket folders and short run posters. Previously, when the company had a short run order for pocket folders, it had to print the outside of it on a digital system and then attach the inside pockets manually or print them on a conventional press. But the setup costs using offset made a small run of pocket folders very expensive for the customer.
Now, Worth Higgins & Associates can offer short run pocket folders for a third of the price it could offer if produced on a conventional press — and with quick turnaround. One of the company's customers is a financial services firm that brings on 30 to 50 new hires at a time. Worth Higgins & Associates is producing short run pocket folders for the firm so that when new employees walk in for training, they can be given a pocket folder with their name printed on it.
Another customer enjoying the advantages of the Impremia IS29 is a theater company that hires artists to create artwork for each of its productions. Producing posters for each of the shows used to put a huge strain on the theater's budget. With the new system, Worth Higgins & Associates can print 40 each of 10 different show posters at a very reasonable cost. "Of course, the price is something that is very attractive to them, but so is the quality of the images. The Impremia IS29 makes it possible for us to deliver on both — price and quality," says Hudson.
Mr. Kelly also appreciates the durability of the ink when cured with UV. "With our other digital press, if a piece was going to go through the mail, the ink had a tendency to get scuffed. The UV inks are much harder and they don't scuff," said Kelly. "The production coming off the UV press can also go straight to bindery. It doesn't have to sit on the floor and dry as it would with a non-UV press."
Worth Higgins & Associates is finding it makes sense to migrate more jobs to the Impremia IS29. One example is letters that print with variable data for banking and university customers. In the past, the company printed the shell of the letters on an offset press, trimmed them to 8.5" x 11" (216 x 279 mm) and then imprinted the variable data from a digital device. Now it can migrate that work and do everything at once on the Impremia IS29, saving time and expense.

Sharing the future with customers

Worth Higgins & Associates held an open house to show off the Impremia IS29 on September 15, 2016 from 4 pm until 9 pm. The open house included a food truck court with some of the more popular food trucks in Richmond. "We were so proud to put on this event and share with our customers our expanded capabilities," says Hudson. "We conducted tours through our facility and then took smaller groups of 10 to 15 people at a time to show them a video about the press and then gave them an up-close look at the Impremia IS29 in action. Everyone was equally impressed with the color quality, the substrate flexibility and the complex variable data capabilities of this system."
Rick LaReau, CEO of Worth Higgins & Associates, sums it up: "We have been offering digital printing at our facility for approximately 20 years. However the Impremia IS29 goes beyond just producing quality digital print. From a standpoint of economy, we can be more competitive in the digital market. Fewer sheets needed yields more cost-effective products that we can produce, and we pass the savings on to our customers. It is innovative technology that successfully fills the gap between both mainstream offset and digital. One of our favorite expressions at Worth Higgins & Associates is that we are not only good at what we do, we also celebrate others who are good at what they do. Komori is a company that continues to demonstrate this excellence to us, and we jumped at the chance to get our hands on this exciting product. We see the Impremia IS29 as the future of technology, and we are thrilled to partner with Komori to see where this technology can take us."