Marlowe Graphic Services Ltd, Kings Langley, is celebrating a successful 2010, and already looking to make 2011 another record breaking year.

The company provides a wide range of pre-press product and service to businesses of all shapes and sizes throughout the UK. Product includes both new and used computer-to-plate solutions as well as refurbished imagesetters, software RIPs and workflow solutions, and hands-on technical service. During 2010 Marlowe also finalised its arrangements with HighWater Products and is now responsible for the exclusive supply of spare parts and technical support around the world for these UK manufactured machines. In addition to this the company provides service for the Chinese CRON CtP solutions for some 27 EU countries. These products are distributed under the HighWater CTP banner.

“We were delighted with the level of equipment sales,” said Sales Director Andy Hemmings. “We installed some 22 CtP products during 2010, including new machines from Screen, FFEI, and HighWater. We have also registered a number of successes with our recently publicised Platinum Green laser upgrade. This allows the latest range of low-chemistry plate solutions to be used on older HighWater Platinum CtP systems. Imagesetter sales have also kept up during the course of the year as well. We sold and installed nine units. The extended benefit for these sales for Marlowe is that they all incorporate service contracts.”

Marlowe is already keeping up this impressive hit rate with four CtP installations in 2011 already, and a healthy looking enquiry book.

In the software arena the company sold 40 copies of StudioRIP, many of which were supplied with the above mentioned hardware sales.

Overall the company has significantly increased its turnover from £820,000 in 2009 to £1.5 million in 2010. Commenting on the excellent increase in performance, Darren Eliot, Managing Director, said: “Certainly our sales of hardware and software have been a major factor in the overall performance of the business, but our service contract business has shown significant improvement as well. The strong ties that we have forged with both HighWater CTP and HighWater Products this year have been very beneficial, and will continue to be an important revenue stream for the foreseeable future. We provide technical service for both businesses: HighWater CTP for CRON products in both UK and Europe; and HighWater Products for HighWater branded products worldwide.”

With regard to the growth in UK service contract business, Marlowe has had to further expand its team of skilled engineers, with four more members added to the team during 2010.