For 25 years, Cheque-Mates, part of Lamson Paragon Group, has been a big name in the for-trade mailing sector. Now it’s serving the industry in a new way, with the launch of a national wide-format printing service based out of its offices in Sefton, Sydney.
The new service, CM Wide, employs an array of latex and aqueous printers including an HP Latex 360, supported by cutters, plotters and laminators. These new printers will help CM Wide become a powerhouse in the wide-format sector, says Peter Cowell, NSW general manager at Cheque-Mates. “We are expanding and complementing our current offering by investing in the best of breed wide-format printing and finishing gear. HP’s Latex ink technology has certainly played an important role in ensuring our offer to the market matched the market’s needs,” he said.
After a quarter of a century in printing and mailing, providing highly automated bidirectional communication campaigns of both marketing and transactional natures, Cheque-Mates made its move into the wide-format sector in response to client demand, to fill a valuable niche in the industry. “Our valued channel partners have been screaming for us to hurry up and get into this growing area for some time now,” Cowell said. “It has always been a key pillar in our overall growth strategy of diversifying whilst complementing our existing offering to our channel partners.”
Business has boomed since CM Wide launched three months ago, with plenty of enthusiasm from clients, says Cowell. “It’s been going really well. We’ve had a lot of support from our channel partners, and also our supply partners. It’s been fantastic,” he said.
CM Wide works with a range of substrates and applications, from basic bond paper through to textiles, decals, floor and wall graphics, pull-up banners and magnetic materials. “There’s just so many new and innovative substrates, it’s amazing,” Cowell said. “From DL flyers to 5 metre window decals, our partners demand consistency and we can deliver on that.”
Though he admits it’s been a bit of a learning curve, Cowell is confident that he and his team, including highly experienced new talent with expertise in sign and display, have the skills necessary to ensure CM Wide’s success. “Our experience in the small-format digital space means we’re very good with managing colour, automating workflows and managing different types of RIP software, so that’s a huge help. In just three months we have installed numerous quality projects. The feedback from our channel partners has been exceptional – something our team are really proud of,” he said.
“Having the right team members in the right positions has been important to allow us to add value for our channel partners and to be the ‘trusted advisor’ many need,” he said.