Book printer Tara Art expands capacity with new equipment

Amit Tara, director – marketing, Tara Art Printers, said: “Being a quality printer, we need a brand-new printing press. We are familiar with Heidelberg printing presses, it is the best for quality print production and finally their after sale service is also  good.

“We have invested around two million euros in last four years. Return on investment on a brand-new printing press is a challenge but once the customers  knows your printing strength, they are willing to  pay a premium”, added Tara. 

Tara Art Printers, a family run business was started by Surinder Nath Tara in 1967 with an investment of Rs 10,000  and a letterpress. Amit Tara is a printing engineer from London College of Printing and the second generation in the business. 

The commercial and book printing house commissioned a brand new fully automatic Polar cutting machine and four-colour Heidelberg PM74, Kodak thermal CTP with 16-up size, complete overhaul of the bindery including perfect binder and three knife-trimmer from Welbound, a brand-new section sewing machine from Aster which runs 150 cycles per minute with eight-stations and a Stahl folder, refurbished Muller Martini gang stitcher to produce 45 different magazines per month.  

Tara prints catalogs, advertising materials and books for Oxford, Evergreen, Frank Brothers and magazines ranging from sports, health, software, fashion, telecom, automobiles and others. 30% magazines, 40% books, around 15% marketing collateral and the rest miscellaneous products including calendars and manuals complete the entire production.  

The commercial printing facility produces around 300 thermal plates to feed 19 printing units, and these printing units convert around ten tonnes of paper per day.  The company has two facilities – in Delhi with 2500 sq/ft area is responsible for marketing, accounts, co-ordination and design, and in Noida a 60,000 sq/ft fully constructed building is dedicated for production. Around 200 workers work round the clock in both the facilities to continue the operation.  

“There is a shortage of skilled labour for brand new printing presses and equipment in the country. We orgainsed in-house training sessions and workshops to train our staff. We always break our target in to small parts and achieve them. We believe that if your customers win then  we will win automatically”, added Tara.  

Speaking about the adevnt of continuous inkjet technology in printing of books, Tara said: “Digital medium will affect the traditional print but it is a long mile to go, right now I do not see any kind of trouble for printed magazines and traditional books in India."  

This News article appeared in the 27 January 2012, Vol IV Issue 10 issue of PrintWeek India Magazine