Gowarsons Ricoh its way to short-run book printing
Established as Atar Chand Kapoor, a book selling company, in Lahore in the year 1888, Gowarsons Publishers has recently commissioned a Ricoh 907S digital production printing press to meet its short-run book printing demand.
15 Dec 2012 | 7966 Views | By Rahul Kumar
The Gowarsons Group includes five companies - Gowarsons Publishers, Kanti Kapur, Madhu Muskan Publications, Madhu Muskan Leasing and Financing and M M Printing Inks. The machine has been supplied by Nisko Enterprises.
“We commissioned the Ricoh press for VDP and short-run production. We have been using Ricoh machines from more than a decade, and are satisfied with the performance of the machine and the service backup provided by Ricoh. Very soon, we will also be looking to add colour digitisation capabilities,” explained Deepak Kapur, director, Gowarsons Group.
The company is managed by three generations of Kapurs and his sons - Mohinder, Satish and Pranav. Kapur is a charted accountant by while Pranav has degrees in engineering and finance and has worked for MNCs in London before returning to India to help his father in managing the business.
The company which is now run by the fifth generation shifted its base in 1947 from Lahore to Delhi.
“We used to publish numerous books and magazines including Madhu Muskan, a children's weekly and Movie Jagat from our own stable and comic books from aboard such as Commando comics from DC Comics Scotland, the Archie Comics series from the US and Asterix from France. In fact, during the tenure of Indira Gandhi, several of the Prime Ministers’ speeches were also printed at our units. Today, a major part of our business comes from the state government institutions and pharma companies,” said Deepak Kapur.
Gowarsons has two printing facilities– one in Mayapuri and the other in Gurgaon. Both the units house a wide range of machines, several sheetfed and web offset presses and long-sized cloth and paper envelop production units. Together the units convert more than 1,000 tonnes of paper per month.
The company with an annual turnover of 25-cr last year, has a work force of 300 people. It plans to venture into the packaging segment, especially the FMCG and labels segment in future.
Kapur added that in order to cater to this market, Gowarsons might need to setup another unit as the existing ones are already nearing their capacity. “We are waiting for the right time when the finance and market create a fertile environment for expansion. We are trying to gradually shift our dependence from government to private sector. Currently, around 70% of our production caters to the projects attained from government institutions,” concluded Kapur.