4DM are proud to be sponsoring the 1st Teams of Market Harborough Squash and Racketball Club in the Leicestershire and Northamptonshire Leagues for the 11/12 season. However instead of the traditional company logo, 4DM have opted for a fully branded QR code to be printed on the back of the team shirts.

Keen to promote this fast growing technology 4DM saw the opportunity to showcase just one of the new media products that it has to offer through its ‘Smart Media’ range which includes case studies on a number of successful PURL campaigns as well as their fully bespoke web to print offering.

QR codes can and are being used in a whole manor of ways and with the percentage of people with smartphones growing by the day companies are fast realising the huge potential of this and other forms of digital communication.

For further information on our Smart Media solutions please feel free to contact Owen Purkis on owenpurkis@4dm.co.uk

Kettering based direct mail printer 4DM Group has recruited a dedicated web to print specialist. Owen Purkis joins as Business Development Manager whose sole responsibility is to develop the new technology side of the business which incorporates a bespoke web to print service.

He joins from Just Digital and brings over 19 years of experience in sheet-fed and web litho plus digital print incorporating web to print and new media solutions.

“I am very excited to be joining 4DM, they have a great offering to clients, a great vision for future technologies through their Smart Media solutions and share my own ethos in providing clients with excellent customer service” he comments.

Lance Hill, Group Sales & Marketing Director adds “Owen has confirmed what I knew already, our new technology services, which we call Smart Media, is one of the best kept secrets in the industry and we really need to change that. We’ve always had the technical ability and have proven that we can build and deliver bespoke online platforms for web to print, PURL’s and variable QR codes, we just need someone to get the shop window right and I firmly believe Owen is the right person to do this”.

Vision in Print (ViP) have commenced a ‘Lean’ manufacturing programme with Kettering based 4DM Group.

The initial 2 day snapshot audit carried out by ViP engineers indentified significant opportunities to enhance 4DM’s already efficient operation which will result in greater accuracy, increased capacity and an all round ‘lean’ business.

Chairman and CEO, Charles Grant-Salmon comments “Vision in Print come highly recommended from our industry and we look forward to the positive changes it promises to deliver. The team are extremely motivated and committed to the cause and have already started rolling out incentives across the business.”

Eclipse Colour, who recently acquired a 10% stake in 4DM, has worked closely with ViP since 2006 and the changes made have shown substantial benefits in their operations... "We have created a genuine culture of continuous business improvement. Our commitment to the ‘Lean’ manufacturing process has delivered significant rewards, both commercially and in the contribution from our workforce." comments Eclipse Colour Managing Director, Simon Moore.

Eclipse Colour scooped the evening’s top prize, being crowned the federation’s Company of the Year (over £5m turnover).

"It was a real privilege to be named the company of the year by an organisation like the BPIF and reflects what a great year we had in 2010," said Eclipse managing director Simon Moore.

"It will certainly give the whole team a real boost and will highlight to our customers that they really are dealing with an award-winning company."

The awards were held at London’s revamped Café de Paris and hosted by comedian Mark Steel. BPIF chief executive Kathy Woodward, who officially took charge of the federation on 1 June, used her welcome speech to the event’s 250 attendees to heap praise on the shortlisted companies and winners and highlight how their efforts proved the industry had plenty to shout about.

"We wanted this year’s awards to different, edgy and highlight what a great industry print is and I hope we achieved that," said Woodward.

Kettering based Eclipse Colour and the 4DM Group have completed a deal to merge their businesses to become one of the UK’s largest independent commercial print and direct mail providers.

Eclipse Colour will acquire an immediate 10% stake in 4DM as part of a 5 year strategy with the eventual outcome of Eclipse, under the leadership of Simon Moore, taking a majority shareholding in the 4DM Group.

The two firms have links that go much further than being next door neighbours - Eclipse MD, Simon Moore and 4DM Chairman & CEO, Charles Grant-Salmon’s relationship goes back over 20 years when they first worked together, so it’s not surprising that both organisations share the same ethos and culture where customer service has been central to their respective success.

“Charles and I see this as a fantastic opportunity to build a fully integrated marketing services provider where two well established businesses with like minded staff come together to pool strengths, technology and innovation. I’m very excited about the plans we have and am looking forward to the implementation of the medium and longer term strategies of both companies” ...comments Simon Moore.

Charles Grant-Salmon adds... “This merger marks the start of a new chapter for both Eclipse and 4DM where our joint goal is to become best in class, providing our collective clients with a wide range of services from the obvious print and direct mail through to innovative digital multi media campaigns. I firmly believe that with the companies being gradually integrated, we have the right customers, reputation and highly skilled, committed staff to deliver our objectives.”

Simon and Charles also share the same view regarding the need to continually invest in the latest technology to be able to offer the market place the latest in product innovation and deliver the value that an ever demanding client base is looking for. Recent investment and increased plant and capacity in both businesses will see the combined turnover rising in a controlled and sustainable way moving them into the top 10 of the DM league table.

Direct mail printer 4DM Group has invested in a Duplo bookletmaker on the back of a major contract win.

Kettering-based 4DM won a contract to provide personalised colour digital booklets to a blue-chip company on a weekly basis.

According to group sales and marketing director Lance Hill, the high-profile win allowed it to make the investment in the £50,000 machine.

4DM also bought a Zebra P330i card imaging machine as the project requires a personalised card to be affixed to the product.

The bookletmaker has opened the door for 4DM to offer the service to other clients and Hill said that several had already been in contact.

He said: "We have definitely seen an increase in demand from our client base for fully personalised digital booklets which we can print on our Xerox iGen3 or 700s.

"I hope this is the first step of many into this arena and we are also looking at further significant investments in the new year to boost other areas of the business."

4DM have enjoyed FSC & PEFC Chain of Custody certification for the past two years. It has proved an important asset allowing us to promote the use of materials originating from well managed sustainable forests, particularly useful of late with the growing popularity of ‘green mailings‘.

FSC Friday, held this year on 24/09/10, is an international day acclaimed day aimed at raising FSC awareness around the world.

We seized the opportunity ahead of our annual FSC/PEFC surveillance auditor visit, to use FSC Friday as a vehicle to help promote FSC awareness across our business.

In addition to informative factory notice board displays, our 4DM purl personalised monthly calendar carried details encouraging walks in local forests and woods accompanied by a nationwide walk guide. FSC fact sheets were handed out internally, staff were encouraged to wear something green, plant a tree for £1 and enter a spot-the-leaf competition to win FSC related products.

We successfully raised staff awareness, had some fun and marked the international occasion. We even got a mention on the FSC website!