Printing the Future

&Friends: Impress Print Services

There’s an elephant in the room. And it’s made out of ink and paper. As designers we are often asked to create print documents, some of which are directly calling on others to make a call to action for a less wasteful society. This hypocrisy has not escaped our notice. So we simply had to ask the question… “In a digital world, is there an ethical case for print?”. We visited our print works Impress to find out.

The case for print

There’s no hiding the fact that the digital age is upon us. Media of all forms is moving online and many have been forecasting the death of print media for a number of years. Yet print is not dying — it’s thriving. The sale of books is on the rise and there’s a clear desire from all corners of society for a more tactile and stimulating reading experience. Print is simply more engaging and makes a more lasting impression. And it’s for this reason that we decided way back when, to produce Change/Maker in this way.

But as you can imagine, this decision raised a number of concerns. Can you genuinely produce a printed publication, for physical distribution, in an environmentally conscious and sustainable way? Thankfully we didn’t have to look too far for the answer.

Enter, Impress. Founded by Mike Kille in the late 1980s, he turned a small printing business that operated under a railway-arch into one of the most innovative, award-winning print works in the country.

We caught up with Mike and Account Manager Richard Harvey to learn how they’ve built sustainability into everything they do.

Sustainability everyday

The thing that sets Impress apart from the rest, is that sustainability is central to the business. “We’re constantly working towards it”, says Mike, as we begin our tour around the facility. “We started with the ISO 14,001 standard, which quite a few people have, but we weren’t content stopping there. We want to be leading the industry and driving things forward. We’ve been looking at everything we do, how we do it and what we can improve on.”

We’ve pretty much eliminated plastics form our business, down to the tape we use on our boxes. - Mike Kille

Carbon balancing

Impress has chosen to participate in a World Land Trust scheme (backed by David Attenborough) to carbon balance its operations. “We buy up areas of rainforest in Vietnam, which is protected, allowing the local rural population to live and work in the land that they’ve been brought up in,” says Mike, proudly.

“The idea is to generate an ecosystem that’s viable for every day, as opposed to what we’ve seen in places like the Amazon, which is disappearing at an alarming rate.” When asked why they chose this route, Mike was fairly damning in his assessment of traditional carbon offsetting. “We looked at carbon neutral schemes and felt it was all about buying and selling things on the stock market and we didn’t really know what the money was going into. What we liked about this scheme was that we could not only balance our paper use, but also balance the whole factory.”

There is still some onus on the customer though, as the cost of balancing the paper itself would be astronomical for the volumes Impress get through. “Whether a customer is interested or not, the whole production is balanced and then the paper is on request. We have a lot of customers that do it and this number is multiplying. People are realising this is a good thing to be doing.”

We ask what role they see themselves playing in advocating its uptake by their customers — Richard jumps in: “Absolutely, we try to talk about it strategically and see it as an education. But there’s a sensitive way to do it. Some take it for granted that all printers are working this way, but they’re not. There’s only a handful of printers in the country doing what we’re doing.”

Renewable energy

The Impress estate is… well, impressive. With four buildings, that cover everything from lithographic print, digital print and direct mail, it constitutes a large part of an industrial estate in Surrey.

Three years ago, the whole business was transitioned to renewable energy. But, Mike is keen to go further and outlined their plans for 2020. “We’re in the process of ordering and installing solar panels on the roof of each building. When that project completes, all of our buildings will be entirely self-sufficient for electricity, and anything that goes out will be truly carbon balanced.”

Circling the supply chain

The circular economy is something Impress have been advocating for a number of years, positioning them at the leading-edge of print manufacturing.

One area of focus has been the physical printing, cutting and binding machines they invest in. Mike is keen to demonstrate how taking a circular approach benefits the business’ bottom line, as well as improve the company’s green credentials. “We investigate the upgradeability and longevity of all of our machines now. We bought our Kodak NexPress in 2012, specifically for its modular setup. All the parts can be taken out and they can be sent back to be refurbished. Since purchase we’ve also added a sheet feeder, white and gold sensory ink enhancements and a thick sheet upgrade. With many other press manufacturers, you’d have to buy a new machine. So, in those seven years we would have had to go through four different presses. It would have become so wasteful and so costly.

“All of our consumables get recycled including plastic digital ink cartridges which get taken away, refilled and sent back. Damaged cartridges are ground down and remade into wall plugs for screws or buckets and paint pots. A steel ink drum system has been installed for lithographic inks, avoiding plastics completely — the drums themselves get taken away, refilled and returned.”

We go on to talk about how this has changed the relationship between Impress and the machine manufacturer. “The whole way of setting the equipment up and our working relationship is much closer. They’re not just selling us a product for us to use and dispose of, we’re building an ongoing partnership where they’re incentivised to look after us. They take feedback and are responsive to our needs.”

“There are only a handful of printers in the country doing what we’re doing.” - Richard Harvey

The case against recycled paper

For a lot of people, opting to use recycled paper is their first thought when considering how to print responsibly — as was ours. But Richard told us why this might not always be the case: “It’s about the journey the paper has to go through from the mills to us and the chemical treatments that are used to bring the recycled stock up to usable standard. Then there’s the issue of contamination. We believe that Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification is the way to go when sourcing paper.”

“The main thing is making sure that people are recycling paper, rather than necessarily using recycled paper for high-quality printing. For example, if it’s going to be made into a brown box, it doesn’t require the level of cleaning or chemical processing, as if it was going to be white paper.

“It’s great to know that FSC European forests are actually growing as a result of the paper and wood industries, soaking up additional carbon.”

Animal welfare

It may come as a surprise that the print industry may use animal products or testing in its materials. Impress is committed to going 100% vegan and has recently been approved by the Vegan Society.

The process was lengthy as Mike’s team needed to gather information from all of the manufacturers and suppliers in their value chain, to understand the background of all the ingredients in use.

“At the moment our standard stock papers, as well as our colour process and digital inks have all been approved. On this basis, the products we can produce are folding leaflets and stitched books. The special colours are currently being assessed, as well as the glues we use for binding. It can be a struggle to get back from the suppliers 100% of the information that you need so the process takes time.”

Everything we print on behalf of our clients is 100% carbon balanced, FSC® certified and only uses vegan-approved paper and inks in its production.

To find out more visit: impressprint.co.uk