Linney has continued its 2025 investment journey with installation of a Horizon StitchLiner MkIV to upgrade production of personalised booklets.
The investment follows on investment in a flexo label press and a Xerox Iridesse at its Quadrant site earlier this year.
The StitchLiner includes an HQF400 digital sheet and cover feeder. This enables integrity checked production of variable content and personalised booklets. The sheet feeder includes a barcode reader for 1D and 2D barcodes that triggers job data and ensures that the booklet being produced meets the specification set for it.
“Our clients are increasingly looking for personalised booklets rather than generic ones,” says director Charles Linney. “Barcode reading allow for precise job tracking and ensures the correct page sequence, reducing errors and enhancing workflow efficiency. This combination offers high speed, variable pagination stitching, folding and trimming while seamlessly integrating variable data.”
The company carried out thorough investigations of what was available on the market to replace an ageing booklet maker which lacked the automation and productivity of the Horizon. Linney reckons the new set up will provide three times the capacity of the older machine.
He adds: “Our main reason for purchasing the StitchLiner MK IV was to keep up with increasing customer demand for stitched books and booklets. It also ensures we are in complete control of our production area. Our clients are at the heart of our operations and this strategic investment helps us stay true to our Healthy Linney values to ‘never let a customer down’.”
IFS has supplied the StitchLiner with Horizon’s IceLink cloud based workflow. This gives the company, and its customers, full traceability of production, an audit trail and real time data on job progress. “This is vital information for some of our clients who wish to check the accuracy of the work we produce for them,” says Linney.
Installation of the finishing machine follows on from the purchase of a Focus Proflex 330SE hybrid narrow width label press. This is a part flexo, part inkjet machine purchased to enable the business to handle growing volumes of short run work while retaining the ability to run flexo only on longer run jobs. Inline finishing is included along with Konica Minolta inkjet printheads.
