Precision Dialogue Installs Xeikon 8500 to Produce Direct Mail Pieces
ITASCA, IL—September 11, 2013—Xeikon NV, an innovator in digital color printing technology, announced that Precision Dialogue, an analytics-driven, multi-channel, customer engagement firm based in Chicago, has purchased and installed a Xeikon 8500 digital color press to boost production of high-quality, data-driven direct mail pieces.
Precision Dialogue provides industry leading lettershop and mailing services, managing over one billion mail pieces annually. They combine innovative thinking with operational flexibility and postal optimization processes to deliver greater responses with less spend.
Phil Manade, director of data services/digital imaging for Precision Dialogue, said the company chose the Xeikon 8500 for a combination of reasons:
- Operating economics: Xeikon offers an “à la carte” pricing model where customers only pay for what they use in terms of toner and consumables rather than a fixed price as is the case with click-based models. As a result, Precision Dialogue can achieve much better operating economics with the Xeikon technology, according to Manade.
- No substrate pre-coating: Unlike competing digital color presses, Xeikon presses print on a wide range of substrates, including conventional substrates, without any pre-coating. “We don’t have that much control over our clients’ substrates, so having the widest substrate envelope possible was very important to us,” Manade said.
- “Offset-like” printing quality: Precision Dialogue was searching for a digital press that could offer “offset-like” printing quality. The Xeikon 8500 offers true 1,200x3,600 dpi imaging addressability, exceeding the capabilities of competing digital solutions that Precision Dialogue evaluated.
“Xeikon’s digital technology has injected new life into printed mail pieces, offering compressed production cycles for full color variable campaigns, while not compromising on our clients’ quality expectations,” noted Precision Dialogue CEO Tom Ragen. “Precision Dialogue’s investment in this technology increases our overall print capacity and streamlines our integrated print and mail workflow to contain total implementation costs for increasingly targeted campaigns. With its powerful X-800 Digital Front End, the Xeikon 8500 is ideal for projects requiring extensive one-to-one personalization.”
Michael V. Ring, president of Xeikon America, also added: “In today’s information-cluttered world where consumers are bombarded with hundreds of marketing messages, personalized full-color direct mail pieces should be part of every marketer’s direct marketing strategy. We’re proud to partner with an innovative company like Precision Dialogue, which clearly recognizes the potential of the Xeikon 8500 for direct mail, with the press’ unbeatable combination of productivity, quality and cost efficiency.”
About Xeikon
Xeikon NV. (XEI: AEX) is an innovator in digital printing technology. The company designs, develops and delivers web-fed digital color presses for labels and packaging applications, document printing, as well as commercial printing. These presses utilize LED-array-based dry toner electrophotography, open workflow software and application-specific toners.
As an OEM supplier, Xeikon designs and produces platemakers for newspaper offset printing applications.
Xeikon also manufactures basysPrint computer-to-plate (CtP) solutions for the commercial printing market. These proven CtP systems combine the latest exposure techniques with cost-efficient UV plate technology, high-imaging quality and flexibility.
For the flexographic market, Xeikon offers digital platemaking systems under the ThermoFlexX brand name. ThermoFlexX systems provide high resolution plate exposure including screening, color management, as well as workflow management.
All the Xeikon solutions are designed with the overarching principles of profitability, quality, flexibility and sustainability in mind. With these guiding principles and a deep, intimate knowledge of its customers, Xeikon continues to be one of the industry’s leading innovators of products and solutions.
