An international fourth generation family run printers and specialist book producer, Halstan was founded by Harold Smith in 1919 – and today, is led by his great-grandson, Rupert Smith. Historically known for its sheet music printing, the business has evolved in recent years and now offers, alongside sheet music, a wide range of book products including educational textbooks, mainstream books, notebooks and other high-quality publications. Its headquarters reside in Amersham, with additional sites in Germany and the USA.
Halstan has been working with Canon UK & Ireland for a number of years to support its growth and diversification. Following its investment in a Canon imagePRESS device and varioPRINT TITAN toner technologies in late 2018, the business then purchased a Canon varioPRINT i300 in 2019. This resulted in greatly improved efficiencies in Halstan’s existing workload, whilst also attracting business from a range of new customers.
Halstan has once again prioritised its investment plans with the purchase of a Canon varioPRINT iX3200, which will help support its growth ambitions even further. The device offers customers the ability to print on a variety of standard offset coated and uncoated media and textures – whilst also retaining the highest levels of colour quality and consistency. These features will allow Halstan to greatly increase its production capacity and offer its customers outstanding products.
Rupert Smith, CEO of Halstan, commented: “We strongly believe in developing partnerships with our customers, and finding the best solutions for them. Canon very much backs this ethos, and truly understands the goals we have as a business. The latest purchase will provide us with the additional capacity we need to grow our offering further. And, the print quality and stock diversity of the new system will take Halstan into new markets – a proposition I’m really excited by.
“There are constant demands from the market for shorter print runs and quicker turnarounds. This purchase, combined with new investments in our bindery, mean that we will be able to produce the highest quality colour perfect bound, thread-sewn, ota-bound and saddle-wired products in short runs. This will all be driven by automated workflow solutions, which can be linked through to our client’s own ordering systems. This is not only helping them to de-stock, but also to generate efficiencies through the automation of print purchasing operations”.
Stuart Rising, Head of Commercial Print, Production Printing Products, Canon UK & Ireland commented: “We have worked with Halstan for a number of years and its latest purchase of the varioPRINT iX3200 is a testament to this partnership. Halstan has already experienced an incredible amount of success since purchasing the varioPRINT i300 in 2019, and we’re looking forward to seeing how the iX3200 will benefit them in the future. It really is the perfect choice for customers looking for a strong inkjet device that offers not only incredible quality, but also increased flexibility.”
For further information on the varioPRINT iX3200 please visit: https://www.canon.co.uk/business-printers-and-faxes/varioprint-ix-series/