Set up in 1991 by Alistair Wright and Ian Stapleton, Design Supply Limited was originally dedicated to supplying drawing office products to the Architectural and Design markets. The changing printing environment, however, was seen as a major opportunity, and since 2001 the company has been repositioning itself, and specialising in the provision of wide format printing solutions to a diverse customer base.

Design Supply is now a Value Added Reseller for Hewlett-Packard, a Pro Focus dealer for Epson and an authorised large format reseller for Canon, and it has a customer base of 1700, 1500 square feet of warehousing, 1500 square feet of office space and a turnover of £2.5 million.

“Over the past six to eight months the large format market has gone through the roof, right across the board,” says Simon Dyer, the company’s sales director. “We have had a particular increase in enquiries from professional photographers, who are realising what wide format printers can offer them, and many have been astonished at the quality of the output that they are capable of, and how much they can now get for their money.”

Realising that some photographers are still coming to terms with what digital printing can offer them, and are slightly nervous about investing in a field that can seem a little high-tech and daunting, Design Supply have made the decision to offer a total solution if required. This ensures that anyone who comes to them will be guaranteed to get the set up that best suits their personal circumstances. If the customer is not totally satisfied with the goods, or the solution that has been supplied, at any time up to 14 days after installation or delivery, the cost of goods will be refunded against the purchase of any Design Supply product of equal or greater value.

The purchase will also be totally supported by Design Supply, and where possible any faults will be diagnosed and repaired remotely. If the fault can’t be rectified immediately, then a technician will be on site within an average of four working hours during normal Monday to Friday working hours (dependant on the type of service contract purchased).

“We talk to everyone who contacts us at length to make sure that we know what it is that they are hoping to achieve,” says Simon. “We ask a lot of questions and ultimately this helps us to select the printer that is right for the client. We can also supply a full range of media from all the top manufacturers, and we can set everything up and have it running in a photographer’s studio, so that they can be confident that everything has been done right, and that they will get the very best results possible.”