Schoellershammer relies on Epson inkjet printers

SCHOELLERSHAMMER GmbH & Co. KG, a paper manufacturer since 1784, relies on Epson WorkForce Pro solutions for its in-house print jobs.

In the autumn of 1784, Elector Theodor of the Palatinate and Duke of Jülich-Berg gave Heinrich Wilhelm Schoeller permission to convert an iron foundry into a paper mill. Thus the new company name, SCHOELLERSHAMMER, emerged from the surname of the owner and the previous use of the building. Since then, the company has developed very successfully and it has come a long way. In the course of the 1790s, about 139 tonnes of rags had been turned into the rag paper normally used in those days, and the company delivered almost a quarter of a million tonnes of paper in 2015, with an increasing trend. With the Voith XcelLine, a further ultra-modern plant was installed between April and December 2016, alongside the existing paper machine, with which the population of Düren will expand their range of packaging paper with a basis weight of 80 to 120 g/m² above all. With both plants now in operation, the company plans to increase annual production in the medium term to around 500,000 tonnes.

"We have already reduced our company's resources by some 30% by implementing a wide range of different measures", explains Alexander Stern, MD of SCHOELLERSHAMMER GmbH & Co. KG, "but we still need a lot of heat and electricity to produce our high quality papers. To live out our responsibility towards the environment and the region, it is evident that we should deal with natural raw materials in the best possible way. And this principle applies not only to our industrial plants, but to all equipment and tools used in our company".

This was a decisive reason why the company opted to replace its laser printer fleet with energy-saving and clean ink technology. Fortunately, the advantages that Schoellershammer draws from modern Epson inkjet technology are not limited to the environmental aspect. "We were very close to getting new laser machines", says Günter Wirtz, Head of IT at SCHOELLERSHAMMER GmbH & Co. KG. "However, with the Epson inkjet printers, our IT specialist dealer, Ditcon GmbH from Cologne, presented us with a cost-effective, energy-efficient and therefore very interesting alternative". At first, there were quite a few challenges to master, as the printers and multifunction devices had to be used not only in office and industry-specific scenarios, but also as a protocol printer in the process control centre of the newly installed paper machine. "The manufacturer of the machine provides a laser printer as a printing solution," explains Wirtz, "so we have developed a test scenario in cooperation with Ditcon to check whether the inkjet printer meets all our requirements". Therefore, in addition to some WorkForce Pro RIPS R8590DWTF, the company also installed suitable printers and multifunction devices of the 5 and 6 series, and thoroughly tested them in various scenarios. Wirtz said: "The Epson devices passed all our tests, but it is undeniable that many people in IT associate the word inkjet with a home or small office printer. But after we had intensively worked with the Epson WorkForce Pro, this was no longer the case".

Ink technology proved to be advantageous for the Düren-based company in another aspect. Thanks to the virtually emission-free operation of the WorkForce, it was possible to transform the company's traditionally very central printing infrastructure into a more flexible, decentralised variant. "A distributed printer landscape has a number of advantages for our large company", explains Wirtz. "The paths are shorter, there is no difficulty in printing confidential documents, and if a printer should actually have a paper jam or fail for other reasons, you just use the neighbouring device. In addition, colleagues would never have accepted a laser printer in the office or on their own desk out of concern for emissions. This is not an issue with inkjets".

Today, Schoellershammer uses eight WorkForce Pro RIPS R8590DWTF multifunctional devices as departmental and work group printers, either in the hallways or directly in the large offices. In addition, there are about 60 multifunction devices and printers of the WorkForce Pro 5 series and 6 series that are used in all areas of the company. However, their tasks are not limited to traditional document printing in offices and workplaces. They can also be found as process printers in the control centres of the paper machines, they are used by the logistics centre to create dispatch papers for the trucks, and in the meeting rooms, the conference participants are pleased with a quick and uncomplicated production of the protocols. The printers are controlled centrally via web-based software. An MPS system from Ditcon is responsible for their maintenance and the supply of ink.

There are also no complaints regarding the quality and durability of the prints. With the old printing infrastructure, the company had its letterheads made by an external print service provider. However, the WorkForce Pro now takes care of this along with the printouts. Thanks to the DURABrite, Ultra ink used in the Epson WorkForce Pro, the documents printed with Epson are also resistant to ink bleeding and smearing. Even the use of a text marker, for example, is possible immediately after printing. As well as being on certified paper, documents produced by Epson WorkForce Pro are documented in accordance with the official regulations for notaries (DoNot).

"We are currently using some eight laser printers for certain heavy-duty applications", says Wirtz. "We would also like to have some additional options for the ink printers, such as a sorter or finisher, as our goal is to completely replace the lasers. But we are confident that Epson will provide a solution that we will then use. "For us, inkjet printers are the e-cars of the printing industry".

In addition to the Epson WorkForce Pro print solutions, Schoellershammer also relies on Epson projection technology. A total of 6 Epson EB-585W projectors will be installed in the company's conference rooms.

Link to the film SCHOELLERSHAMMER

SCHOELLERSHAMMER GmbH & Co. KG is supplied and supported by:

Ditcon GmbH
Fuggerstraße 26
51149 Cologne, Germany

Tel.: 02203/8986-0

info@ditcon.de
www.ditcon.de