Specialist printer Wyndeham Press said new contract wins had boosted its market share and helped drive full-year profits to the top end of expectations.

The Hove-based group, which employs 1,800 people around the UK, has benefited from additional work in the magazine sector, including five titles for Reed Business Information and IPC Media's flagship title Ideal Home.

The IPC contract alone, which includes television listings and various women's weekly titles, is worth about £1 million a year for three years.

The contract wins have enabled Wyndeham to more than replace lost business, even though the current trading climate has shown only a slight improvement.

Restructuring and the review of an underperforming business are now set to leave annual profits at the top end of market hopes, currently £4.3 million.

The figure for the year to March 31 is down on the £6.4 million a year earlier, although profits at the firm's Hove Street branch are forecast to rally to about £7.4 million in the new financial year.

That figure has been revised upwards following last month's acquisition of Graphic Facilities, a pre-press and print process firm bought for £5.9 million.

The takeover made Wyndeham's Argent branch the biggest pre-press operation in the country.

Chairman Bryan Bedson said the company had made great progress in the second half of its financial year, particularly after cost-cutting and moves to strengthen the company's management and sales teams.

He said: "The results of these actions have already been seen through a number of successful contract wins and improved profitability and we still have capacity to take advantage of further available opportunities to increase our market share."

Earlier this month Roy Kingston joined the management team as group operations director after a switch from the St Ives Web Division.

The group, which last year had a drop in pre-tax profits from £3 million to £1.9 million, handles 650 titles a month.

Tuesday April 27, 2004