Once every two years since 1994 the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers, WAN-IFRA, has offered newspapers worldwide an opportunity to demonstrate their colour printing excellence by organising a print-quality competition. Newspapers that succeed in qualifying for inclusion in the list of the world’s best printers can draw on this distinction to optimise their work processes, motivate their personnel, improve their standing among their readers, and impress demanding advertising customers.

Participating in this year’s competition were 128 companies from all over the world.  The below table shows all members of the Color Quality Club 2016–2018 in alphabetic order.

Club membership is offered to all companies that show they can produce high-quality newspapers consistently over an extended time period. Evaluation of newspapers is divided into two parts – an evaluation based on objective measurements made on a test element (WAN-IFRA Cuboid) that newspapers have to print every day of one week per month for a period of three months; and a visual inspection by a jury of international newspaper experts. Participating newspapers must prove that they can consistently print in accordance with proven international quality standards and also ensure that the newspaper copy is clean and free of quality defects.

With their successful participation in the competition, the companies have demonstrated that they can supply newspaper printing of outstanding quality and offer readers and advertisers high-quality products.

The Color Quality Club is more than a technical printing competition, since it offers participating companies the additional possibility to benchmark their printing quality against recognised international standards and improve it.

“INCQC 2016-18 was tougher than the previous editions of the competition. We asked newspapers to print the WAN-IFRA Cuboid test element every day of one week per month for three consecutive months, and we picked the date for evaluating the copies,” said Manfred Werfel, Deputy CEO of WAN-IFRA. “Still, 64 companies have secured membership into this prestigious club. It is proof that quality continues to be a passionate area for printers and they are committed to produce high-quality products for their readers and advertisers,” he added.

A brochure presenting the successful participants and their newspaper titles will be available at this year’s World Publishing Expo from 10 to 12 October in Vienna, Austria. More about the International Newspaper Color Quality Club and the World Publishing Expo can be found at colorqualityclub.com and worldpublishingexpo.com.