Three gold medals in Sappi world paperweight title

The Sappi Printer of the Year Awards is the industry’s premier league, the heavyweight division and top of class. It is the authentic world title competition for the printing industry. Photo: Hugh Martin (left) MD Sappi Trading and Tim Schafer, (right) Sappi Trading Australasia congratulate Garth Hackett of Offset Alpine on winning gold.

Judged on a criterion of printing excellence this is the third year that Australian and New Zealand printers have been able to enter and compete on the global scale. The 25-year-old awards are aimed at ‘honouring, rewarding and stimulating superb print craftsmanship in the global printing industry,’

This year the gold winners from Australia are:

• SNP Sprint (Australia) for Holden Statesman Caprice Series ll in the brochures category
• Goanna Print for its Zoo Design Advertising Branding
• Offset Alpine Printing for Australian Geographic – the magazine Jan March 03 issue.

These winners will be flown to the grand final in the USA later this year to match themselves against the winners of the other regions, and if successful to be judged at the same function for the ultimate accolade.

“One of the goals for this year’s competition is to stimulate excellence,” said Hugh Martin, Managing director of Sappi Trading. “That we are achieving this goal is evident not only from the steadily increasing number of entries we are receiving , but also from the quality of the entries, which is improving year on year.

“We congratulate the gold silver and bronze award winners here tonight . . .and wish the gold award finalists every success as representatives of the Sappi Trading region at the international event.”

The three silver award winners from Australia:

• Scott Print for its New Tel Concise Annual Report
• Daniels Printing Craftsman for Perth Convention exhibition centre presentation folder
• Hannanprint for Delicious – the magazine July issue

Bronze awards went to:

• Daniels Printing Craftsman for Sublime - the book
• Comprint from New Zealand won bronze for NZ Autocar – Sept 2002.

The structure of the awards means that winners are able to progress through a multi-layered series of competitions in order to gain the opportunity of being named Sappi International Printer of the Year. This prestigious title is gaining in significance and cachet every year as the worldwide awards attract more entries. In competing outside national boundaries printers are able to match themselves with the best in the world and therefore can legitimately claim world-class honours.

Australian printers enter their work into the Sappi Trading Printer of the Year competition, joining three other regions serviced by the trading division of the giant corporation – Asia, Central America and South America. The prizewinner is the trading division’s entrant into the Sappi International Printer of the Year, the ultimate accolade judged against the winners from the USA, Europe and South Africa.

Photo: Sappi judge, Greg Grace with gold winners Shane Smithe and Russell West of SNP SPrint.

A panel of experts, including Greg Grace of Heidelberg Australia and New Zealand, judges entries from the different regions. Strict anonymity is maintained so that the UK, French, German and Italian judges have no idea as to the origin of the printed pieces. The Sappi Awards prides itself on structuring the judging to ensure ‘the highest possible standards combined with a balanced, professional perspective.’