Investment has Monster impact on environment

Hollywood Monster invests in two new EFI VUTEk printers, gaining the ultimate in print quality performance, while scaling down the industry’s carbon footprint.

Hollywood Monster, is scaling down the industry’s carbon footprint following a £1.3 million investment in new greener printing technology. With the added value of a local government grant to deliver environmentally-friendly practices, Hollywood Monster looks to reduce the material they send to landfill by around one million sq/m in the next five years.

Already famed for its innovative practices, Hollywood Monster is leading the way in the signage industry by significantly altering its printing processes and impact on the environment.

The EFI VUTEk 5r and VUTEk HS125, implemented by the UK’s leading independent supplier of digital print technology, CMYUK, are the latest in high-quality UV LED printers for super-wide format graphics production.

Robin East, Group Director at CMYUK, said: “These new printers are helping to change the face of the industry, allowing inks to be cured in a way that enables them to print on non-coated material, making the whole process more environmental.”

Hollywood Monster takes signage and graphics to the next level, with consistently innovative and bold statements; but their enthusiasm, it seems, doesn’t end with print. With organisations across the globe looking to reduce, reuse and recycle waste, the printing industry is no exception, and Hollywood Monster have set the bar high with their investment in two of EFI’s most sought-after digital printers.

Simon McKenzie, Managing Director at Hollywood Monster, says: “This is a really big step, not just for us but the UK’s printing industry. We’re the first company in the UK to install the new VUTEk 5r. The incredible HS125 Pro, also LED, was installed six weeks later."

"Both printers have resulted in us being able to print on material that has less of an effect on the environment. It’s also the first time that we have gone into mainstream production with the Greenguard Gold standard inks, which were recently rubber-stamped to go into schools and hospitals."

"Better than that, the change in printing materials means that we’re saving over one million square metres of printed material having to go to landfill in the next five years, because it can now be fully recycled – this helps reduce our customers’ and our own carbon footprint.”

This investment is part of Hollywood Monster’s ongoing dedication to innovation across the graphics and signage sector. They were supported with this environmental technology project with a Green Bridge grant – helping to develop, grow and diversify businesses within the green sector across the West Midlands – which saw them receive £100,000 in funding.

“Bringing these new printers into our factory is just the beginning – we want to change how the industry develops its own practices. We’re working with some of our big retail clients to change their material specifications so that we increase the amount of recyclable material used."

"We are also working closely with mills in Western Europe to look at switching all of our 400,000 square metres of production to fully recyclable materials by 2020. We’re dedicated to being green and our funding and investment really is just the start,” Simon concluded.

With headquarters in Tyseley, Birmingham, Hollywood Monster employs over 70 people and delivers work across the property, construction, retail, corporate, exhibition, décor, outdoor media, event, stadium, museum and theatrical sectors. Clients include Virgin Media, the NEC Group, Cineworld, McDonald’s, Westfield and Lego.

Robin East says “Both the EFI VUTEk 5r and HS125 Pro deliver the ultimate performance and quality in super high-speed LED UV printing. Not only versatile, they produce high-quality graphics with resolutions of true 600 or 1000 dpi and greyscale print capability at up to 450 sq/m per hour.”

East continues, “We love the attitude Hollywood Monster has towards reducing bottlenecks across their entire production landscape. We are also currently implementing Esko’s ‘Automation Engine’, that will integrate directly with their existing Clarity (CRM) software."

"This technology will enable a much faster and more efficient way of processing client artwork onto their presses, greatly reducing administrative and pre-press tasks. For us, this forward-thinking strategy really maximizes the production capacity available from their new EFI VUTEk printers”.