Now, unlike Father Christmas and his elves, we will be taking some time off over the festive period, so thought we’d better let you know when we’re closing. Benwells will be shut from noon on December 22nd, and we’ll reopen on January 4th at 7.30am. Yes, that sounds early, but we’ll be raring to get going on some more of your marvellous printing, embossing and die-cutting jobs.

Until then, best wishes from all of us at Benwells, and see you in the New Year.

Thanks to the lovely and super-efficient Sarah – on work experience with us from UCA Farnham – our office has suddenly become much more organised and stuff is where you’d expect it to be for the first time in years.

In fact, Sarah has done such a stirling job that I’ve now found my long-lost stapler and, more importantly, she has also organised our samples so that they actually look like the works of art we consider them to be.

We’re so proud of them that we’d love to show them off, so any time you want to come down and have a look at our sample gallery, give me a call on 020 7237 5111 or ping me an email to paul@benwells.co.uk to make an appointment, and I’ll show you around.

After all, what’s the point of us making all this lovely stuff if no one gets to look at it?

We’d like to wish all our customers a very Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Benwells will be closed for a well-earned rest from noon on Thursday 23rd December until we’re back on the job at 7.30am on Wednesday 5th January. It’s been a pleasure doing business with you, and we look forward to seeing you again in 2011.

OK, so we realise Bonfire night has only just been and gone, but before you know it Christmas will be upon us and you’ll wonder what happened to the relatively stress-free days of November.

Get a head start on your list of Christmas tasks by ordering your bespoke Christmas cards from us now and avoid the December rush.

We’ll give you a very festive 10% off the price of all Christmas cards produced by the 30th November, whether you go for foil-blocked, embossed, die-cut, or your regular, classic printed cards.

You’ll save a packet and can put the money towards one of those classy light-up Santas for your front garden. Or not. Anyway, you get our (snow) drift.

Email us on estimate@benwells.co.uk or give us a (jingle) bell on 020 7237 5111, quoting ref:bennov10 to see what we can do.

Benwells is giving away paper and no, before you ask, we haven’t gone mad.

We can’t move in our factory for Colorplan and Splendorlux and we need to declutter a bit so we can make room for all the lovely new stock we’ve got coming in.

If you want to print or foil on any of the stock we’ve got left over, have a look at this list of clean, unused paper and let us know what you need.

We will be throwing all of this in our recycling bin on September 30th if it doesn’t make it on to one of our presses before then, so choose your stock, send us your spec and we will quote the job with no charge for the paper.

If you see something you like, let us know asap because we’re giving it away on a first come, first served basis.

Below is a small selection of papers on offer, send us email or give us a call for the full list:

Curious Skin Red 270gsm
Sirio Dark Blue 700gsm
Kaskad Raven Black 350gsm
Splendorgel Extra White 400gsm
Treasury Essence 310gsm

So the business cards are printed 2 colours, PMS 369 and Cool Grey 9, on a premium smooth uncoated stock Mohawk Navajo 270gsm from G F Smith (we could have used 352gsm but they went all a bit springy!) The stock is manufactured in a paper mill powered by the wind which is a quite a nice touch.

Once printed we left them to dry a little, then foil blocked them in our favourite satin silver foil using a CNC die to endure crisp detail. Then we embossed the “b” logo with a specially etched die to ensure deep and pronounced dots, similar to braille. After that we though it best to round corner the cards whilst creasing them. We think round corners are so much nicer than square ones, at the very least it prevents our business cards being used as toothpicks.  

These processes are replicated throughout our stationery suite including letterheads, compliment cards and sample packs, ask for one of them they really are rather beautiful.

We are also putting our logo on plate bags and the like, so if you get a proof delivered chances are it will be in one of these.

You’ve already seen the new website, don’t forget to fill in the sample pack request form so we can show you some beautiful print in a stunning box featuring foil blocking, special embossing, litho printing, silk screen printing and die cutting, oh and some delicate hand make up. Some may say a typical Benwells job!

For those of you that are interested the new identity is by Alistair Hall at We Made This, he’s also been good enough to take some great shots of the identity going through the factory these can be accessed via his flickr site

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alistairhall/sets/72157601343123253/

Our website has been designed by the good people at Breeze, who also took all the rather lovely pictures in the gallery.  

Hope you like - we are certainly really proud of the printed pieces and shiny new website.

Don’t forget to ask for a new sample pack, they really are that good.