Significantly Increased Efficiency with the Primera PRO
With ORDA Print Industries Ltd. and Graphoprint, two leading graphic arts companies in Israel rely on a Primera PRO from Muller Martini. Thanks to its high format flexibility and wide range of feeders, this 14,000-cycle saddle stitcher is ideal for a broad product range – whether for short runs or larger print runs. Both companies have significantly increased their efficiency and reduced staffing requirements.
ORDA Print Industries Ltd.: Achieving All Its Goals with the Primera PRO
For a long time, transactional printing and the associated IT solutions for customers were the core business of ORDA Print Industries Ltd., founded in 1987, which today employs 350 people and entered the digital printing market three decades ago. But after acquiring 18 graphic arts companies, ORDA is now the largest printing company in Israel. The 2019 acquisition of Grapholit Printing House – at the time Israel’s largest heatset printing company – paved the way for ORDA’s entry into commercial printing.
To consolidate the production of saddle-stitched, softcover, and hardcover print products from various locations into a single facility, ORDA opened a state-of-the-art production plant covering an area of 30,000 m2 in Kiryat Gat – about 50 kilometers south of Tel Aviv – in 2020. Although transactional printing still plays an important role, saddle stitching has taken on central importance within the company since the acquisition of Grapholit. For this reason, ORDA commissioned a new Primera PRO in Kiryat Gat in early 2025, equipped with six flat-stack feeders and a cover feeder, a Perfetto cross-stacker, cross-strapping, a robot for product removal, and six stream feeders.
“We were familiar with Muller Martini saddle stitchers from the operations we acquired and consider them the best in the world,” says Eitan Wengrowsky, Vice President of Projects & Integration at ORDA. The Primera PRO, which runs in two shifts and replaced a Tempo, produces approximately two and a half million magazines, catalogs, brochures, and flyers per month for government agencies, banks, insurance companies, and supermarkets. Most print runs range from 10,000 to 500,000 copies per job. As backups and during peak periods, three older Müller Martini saddle stitchers are also in operation in Kiryat Gat.
With the commissioning of the Primera PRO, ORDA has achieved all its goals, according to Eitan Wengrowsky: “We need fewer staff at the saddle stitcher, produce much more economically and flexibly, have increased productivity by 170 percent, and our production runs with significantly fewer interruptions than before. We are therefore very satisfied with the Primera PRO.”
According to the Vice President of Projects & Integration, the same applies to the Alegro perfect binding line installed in Kiryat Gat alongside the Primera PRO, which includes a 3694 collator, a Solit PRO three-knife trimmer, and a CB 18 book stacker.
Thanks to the Primera PRO, ORDA needs fewer staff at the saddle stitcher and can produce much more cost-effectively.
Graphoprint: 50 Percent Fewer Staff Thanks to the Primera PRO
As Israel’s third-largest newspaper, “Haaretz” has had a subsidiary, Graphoprint, for many years. In addition to newspapers, Graphoprint also prints magazines and is a key driver of revenue and profit growth. Located in Kibbutz Tel Yitzhak – about 30 kilometers north of Tel Aviv – with a staff of around 100 it produces over 2 million products per month, primarily in A4 format. Print runs range from a minimum of 5,000 copies up to 120,000 copies.
Graphoprint has relied on Muller Martini saddle stitchers for decades. Prior to the new investment, five Muller Martini machines were in use. “Our experience with them has been nothing but positive,” says CEO Eli Basol. “That’s why it was easy for us to decide on a Primera PRO three years ago.” The Primera PRO replaced three older saddle stitchers at once – a Prima, a Bravo, and a 300 series model. This naturally has an impact on productivity and, ultimately, on profitability. Compared to the older models, the new Primera PRO is fully automated – featuring streamfeeders for feeding the sheets, inline cross-stapling, and a Solema Pluton palletizer. This allows the line to be operated by two to three employees, even at maximum throughput.
“The clear goal of our investment was to increase efficiency and reduce staffing requirements,” emphasizes COO Shahar Shelef. “We’ve achieved that, as we were able to cut labor costs by more than 50 percent compared to our previous setup with three saddle stitchers. And thanks to the high speed of the Primera PRO, we can meet our production schedules and our customers’ deadlines even more reliably.”
At the start of the week, the Primera PRO runs for about twelve hours a day. Toward the end of the week, Graphoprint switches to 24-hour operation – in other words, it runs around the clock. And this is to the great satisfaction of Eli Basol: “Our new saddle stitcher is very reliable. And if a problem ever arises, we appreciate the high quality of Muller Martini’s remote service support. That’s why we’ve extended the remote service contract for another two years.”
Compared to older saddle-stitching models, the new Primera PRO from Graphoprint is fully automated – featuring stream feeders for feeding the sheets, inline cross-stapling, and a Solema Pluton palletizer.
