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Alma Manu
gets
with coldset
CREATIVE
We take a peek behind the scenes at Alma Manu,
a leading Finnish printing house that is growing
its business by developing new services tailored
to the diverse needs of advertisers.
A
lma Manu printing house in
Tampere, Finland is home to
Aamulehti
, the country’s sec-
ond largest daily newspaper founded in
1881. Faced with the slow but steady
decline of printed newspaper circula-
tions and the rapid rise of digital read-
ing, the printing house is taking a cre-
ative approach to drumming up new
business in advertising and magazine
publishing.
Recent improvements in the quali-
ty of coldset offset printing have ena-
bled the printing house to better serve
the special needs of many advertisers.
A large printing house of Alma Manu’s
size can furthermore offer service
models that smaller businesses cannot,
such as effortless printing of advertis-
ing supplements for as many as 60 dif-
ferent newspaper titles.
“It is clearly visible to us that print
generally and especially supplements
have a special place in the advertis-
ing palette of large companies. A print-
ed advertising supplement is a mark of
presence. Whenever a bigger company
enters the Finnish market, they choose
print to make an impression. XXL, Gi-
gantti and Lidl are good examples.
New customers: this way!
A new printing house was built
alongside Alma Manu’s exist-
ing facility in the industrial
area of Sarankulma in
Tampere in 2013.
Alma Manu
employs around 1,000 people, 850 of
whom are postal carriers. Due to long
distances in Finland, the most practi-
cal solution is to deliver daily newspa-
pers straight from the printing houses to
subscriber’s letterboxes. The printing
house runs in three shifts, with about
twenty people working each shift.
During its first two years in opera-
tion, the new printing house focused
on honing its operations and in-house
printing, including the 20 different
newspaper titles owned by Alma Me-
dia, the company that produces
Aamu
lehti
. When all was running smoothly
by early 2015 – at which point
Mat-
ti Käki
joined the team as director –
Alma Manu made the strategic decision
to increase printing advertisements and
external titles.
“Our Manroland ColormanAutoprint
printing press has three folders which
enable us to print three newspapers at
the same time. We print six daily news-
papers in prime time and run at full ca-
pacity at night. But during the day we
have capacity to service advertisers and
other customers,” Käki explains.
Now, in September 2016, most of the
printed titles are for external clients.
Through active sales work, the propor-
tion is expected grow each year.
“We offer services no one else can
offer. It is possible to put out as many
as twelve supplements at once, some of
which can be advertising supplements.
Although Alma Manu has a clear com-
petitive edge on other smaller printing
houses, winning contracts for special
services has required constant research
and development, actively listening to
the customers’ needs and picking up the
phone when necessary,” says Käki.
Creating a great
user experience
A leading role in Alma Manu’s R&D is
played by
Jussi Pekkarinen
, Manag-
er for Quality and Environment. After
31 years at the printing house, his cur-
rent main responsibilities are research
and development, quality management
and environmental issues.
“We have actively taken part in dif-
ferent collaborative research pro-
grammes in the paper and printing busi-
nesses over the years, with UPM as one
of our partners. Taking part in industry
discussions has enabled us to develop
our services to better meet customers’
needs. We are proactive in creating the
best possible print user experience for
the end-customer. A useful service can
be anything from a rain-proof cover for
a track betting magazine to a quick lead
time for a sports publication,” Pekkari-
nen explains.
The future looks promising for Alma
Manu, especially with further improve-
ments awaited in coldest offset printing
thanks to innovations such as UPM Im-
presse Plus C, which – as confirmed in
recent test runs – delivers a more mag-
azine-like feel to coldset printing prod-
ucts.
“A printing house has to find a bal-
ance between giving the customer
what they need for a successful mar-
keting campaigns and finding a paper
that offers a suitable price-quality ratio.
Our customers have been surprised at
what coldset printing can accomplish:
high-quality print at lower cost, along
with a flexible service model and ex-
cellent opportunities for effective audi-
ence targeting,” concludes Käki.
Text and photos:
Saara Töyssy
Print gets the company close to
the customer, into their homes and
hearts. It says: ‘We are here, and
we’re here to stay,” says Matti Käki,
Director of Alma Manu.
UPM
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