The show for shorter-run printing took place November 17-19 in Toronto and was one of the last industry shows in a year highlighted by drupa, Graph Expo, SGIA and numerous other events. By strictly limiting the size of offset presses on exhibit to 29″ (4-up to 6-up sheet size) and smaller, the show was able to focus visitor interest solely on this growing market. Peter Cober (President of Cober Evolving Solutions), Ward Griffin (CEO of Lowe-Martin Group) and Rich Pauptit (President of Flash Reproductions), were some of the many keynote speakers, but I was especially fascinated with a preshow presentation from Kristof Dekeukelaere, Sales Rep at Landa Corp., who articulated quite well the Landa Nanographic Process. A summary of his talk and the basic process is on page 24.
As I walked the floor talking to exhibitors, the reaction ranged from “slow” to “not bad” to “the best show we’ve ever had.” Crowds seemed to peak and fall each day, with exhibitor location and booth size being a major determining factor. Several exhibitors told me they got a huge number of leads and will wait a month or two to see how many will actually pay off. Others with major displays seemed thrilled with the traffic and sales – especially of new products. And there were many great new products at this show making their debut in Canada.
For example, Sydney Stone launched the two new Matrix Series single-sided laminators as the exclusive Canadian distributor. Both the MX-370 and MX-530 provide computer controlled single-sided lamination that is delivered completely separated and ready for paper cutting or the next finishing process. Sydney Stone’s Michael Steele told me that not since the Morgana Major folder, which was launched in 2004, has he sold so many units of a particular machine directly from the show floor.
Jackie Kisiloski from PDS Pressdown said that visitors were interested in what was new and fresh in the marketplace. She told me that the crowds zeroed in on the Rapid Digital printer (which happens to be the world’s fastest desktop printer) and also its line of Opus hardcover book binders. “We had such a good turnout at our booth that at times it was hard to acknowledge everyone’s presence,” said Kisiloski. “I personally found it very exciting this year.”
An always smiling Don Schroeder, V.P. of Sales/Midwest Great Lakes Manager for C.P. Bourg, showed me how to breeze through the four key processes of stitching, folding, spine forming and trimming in one step to produce SquareBack books up to 200 pages thick. The CP Bourg PowerSquare 200, demonstrated for the first time in Canada by supplier Robert E. Thistle Ltd., had fully automatic settings for different book sizes and pagination, including variable stitch leg length for varying book thicknesses. The technology turned a lot of heads.
Here are some photo highlights from this year’s show.