Meet The Print Lord: Jim Cunliffe, 20 Years at the Coalface of Print

Behind every great brand, there is someone who sweats the details. Someone who notices when the black is a fraction too warm, when the laminate is lifting at the corner, or when the turnaround time a supplier has promised is simply not going to happen. At Print Lord, that person is Jim Cunliffe, founder, figurehead, and the man who has spent more than two decades making sure other people’s brands look exactly as they should.

This is his story.

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Twenty Years at the Coalface

Jim did not stumble into print. He grew up in it, learned its language, and came to understand its possibilities and its pitfalls in a way that only comes from years of hands-on experience. Twenty years at the coalface of the print trade means Jim has seen the industry transform around him, from paste-up and film to digital pre-press, from offset runs of tens of thousands to short-run digital personalisation, from print rooms thick with the smell of ink to a world where too many people have convinced themselves the screen has made print irrelevant.

He knows better.

Those two decades gave Jim something more valuable than technical knowledge, though he has plenty of that. They gave him perspective. He has seen the jobs done brilliantly and the jobs done badly. He has watched clients open deliveries with excitement and clients open deliveries with dread. He knows exactly where the process falls apart and, more importantly, he knows how to stop it from doing so.

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Why Print Lord Was Born

Print Lord was not started to fill a gap in the market. It was started out of frustration, and a firm belief that people deserved better.

By the time Jim launched Print Lord, the print industry had developed a worrying habit. The rise of the click-to-basket online printer had made ordering print feel easy, but the experience of receiving it was another matter entirely. No one to call. No one to check your artwork. No one to flag that your logo was in the wrong colour profile, that your bleed was missing, or that the paper you had chosen would make your brochure feel like a supermarket flyer.

Jim had watched too many clients, talented people with brilliant brands, be let down by faceless processes that treated their work as just another job in a queue. A basket. A checkbox. A dispatch note. No care, no accountability, and no one who actually knew what they were talking about when something went wrong.

So he built something different.

Print Lord exists to bring back trust, tangibility, and personal service to an industry that had been quietly hollowing those things out. It is the antidote to the soulless portal. It is what happens when someone who genuinely cares about print, and about the people putting their name to it, decides to do something about it.

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Personal Service. Not Automation.

At Print Lord, you do not deal with a bot or a call centre. You deal with Jim, or with the trusted inner circle he has built around him: Lady Charlotte keeping operations running with precision, Princess Nancy and Maribel the fair maiden ensuring every customer feels genuinely looked after, Scribe Gavin casting his proofer’s eye over the details, and Bookkeeper Michele keeping the numbers honest.

Every project that comes through the door is handled by people who understand print, understand brands, and understand what it means to have your name on the line. Whether it is a run of business cards for a local Brighton start-up or a complex, multi-element campaign for a national brand, the approach is the same. One contact. One invoice. An unwavering commitment to getting it right.

Print Lord does not just take orders. It takes responsibility.

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The Print Lord Character

If you have ever spoken to Jim, you will know that the Print Lord persona is not an act. It is simply who he is. Confident without being arrogant. Warm without being soft. Straight-talking because he respects your time and your intelligence. And, yes, occasionally cheeky, because print should not have to be dull.

He will tell you honestly if your artwork needs work. He will suggest a better paper stock if he thinks it will make your job sing. He will flag a potential problem before it becomes your problem. And if something does go wrong, he will own it, fix it, and make sure it does not happen again.

That is not a service promise printed on a wall. That is how Print Lord operates, every single day.

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Brighton, Hove and Beyond

Print Lord is rooted in Brighton and Hove, with a strong base across Sussex and the wider South East. But the remit stretches far beyond the coast. Print Lord serves clients across the UK, with international delivery available on request.

Local clients can come in for a conversation. National clients get the same attention via phone, email, or an online brief. Wherever you are, the standard does not change.

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The Crusade Continues

Twenty years in, Jim is not done. If anything, the mission feels more urgent. In a world that has spent the last decade telling businesses to go paperless, to ditch the brochure, to trust the algorithm, Print Lord stands firm.

Print is powerful. Print is memorable. Print, done well, does things a screen simply cannot. And Jim has dedicated his career to proving it, one job at a time.

Against the propaganda of the paperless lie.

Print Lord. At your service. On brand. On time.

Ready to work with someone who actually cares? Get in touch at hello@printlord.co.uk or call 01273 526679. You can also browse the shop at shop.printlord.co.uk.