Seeing the light in colour – Print21 magazine article

McKellar Renown Press has become a keen disciple of colour standards following its recent conversion to ISO 12647-2 compliance.

Stephen Norgate, managing director of McKellar Renown Press (McKR) in Melbourne, is almost evangelistic in his dissertation on the company’s recent journey to reach ISO 12647-2 compliance which confirms that McKR prints to the international colour standard for offset print.

“Going through this process was a revelation and I’ve seen the light,” he says emphatically. “That’s how much of an impact getting our colour management processes right has made on the business, from top to bottom.”

McKR is the first company to take advantage of Heidelberg’s new ISO compliance service, including Print Colour Management (PCM) certification, with Soeren Lange, prepress manager, Heidelberg, working closely with Stephen and his brother John throughout the process.

Forging its reputation on producing quality print, McKR holds the contract with iPrint to produce stamps for Australia Post as well as handling major commercial and retail accounts. Why would a company that has built its reputation on quality need to seek ISO compliance? Stephen Norgate says that before he and John went down this path they were literally working in the dark.

“Colour management is the biggest concern for the industry and the biggest cost. It is like kicking a goal and not knowing where the goal post is. You are in nowhere land. But since we’ve achieved ISO certification, we are kicking accurately every time.”

He continues: “Customers expect a great deal more from their suppliers today. If you are going to meet these expectations you have to change the way you think, the way you approach the things you’ve done for years.”

Norgate says achieving accurate and consistent colour management saves customer relationships, which is critical in a competitive market.

“We no longer have those instances where we have unhappy customers. Even if those situations are rare, they are still a cost to the business, one we don’t have to incur anymore.

“There is no pretending this wasn’t a major undertaking for us. Not just in terms of financial investment in new equipment and processes, but also from a cultural perspective. There were times when we felt like pulling the pin, but we persevered and the outcome is more than we could have hoped for. And now we ask ourselves why we didn’t do it earlier.”

Working in sync
Changing the internal culture and attitude was one of the greatest hurdles, says Stephen Norgate, but by taking a consultative approach they worked through issues with their staff without pointing the finger of blame.

“Now prepress and the pressroom are in sync and that is a huge benefit,” he says.

Norgate believes one of the greatest tools in his colour management kit is the quality assurance history sheet.

“With the history sheet we can monitor spikes in colour for every step of the job. These sheets document any variation however minuscule. This information is invaluable allowing us to correct any issues long before the job reaches the customer. And to schedule maintenance and avoid downtime.”

McKR prints for a number of high profile national and global companies including BMW, Mercedes and L’Oréal.

“Many of our clients are well-known brands. As such we have a responsibility to uphold the integrity of that brand,” says Stephen Norgate. “The PCM process and certification to ISO 12647-2 allows us to achieve the highest quality and colour correctness efficiently and repeatedly, day in day out.”

From a practical standpoint, the PCM certification has delivered faster make-ready times, reduced overtime, optimised equipment performance and has significantly cut down on waste.

“Make-ready takes a quarter of the time it used to and this is especially true with our stamp work which is closely scrutinised both by our client and also by stamp collectors,” says Norgate, adding that the benefits are much more than saving time and money. “We now have peace of mind. John and I can actually go home at night and not worry about how jobs are progressing. It’s given us our lives back.”