Cleveland Steel recently won a prestigious international lithography award for the Olympic® Deck & Fence Clear Protec-tor five-gallon pail that it manufactures for PPG Industries.

The National Metal Decorators Association honored Cleveland Steel with an Award of Excellence in the 3rd Annual Excellence in Quality contest co-sponsored by Crabtree of Gateshead, Ltd.

"We felt we had done an excellent job and, as it turned out, we were one of the best lithographers in our category," said George Hardick, General Manager of Cleveland Steel's Niles, Ohio, plant where the lithography work was done. "We are proud of the people who do the work here. We felt we had a good shot. We appreciate the confidence PPG had in Cleveland Steel to do a superior job."

After receiving entries from metal decorators around the world, judges based awards on design, print quality, degree of difficulty, coatings finish and overall appearance. The association created the competition to recognize companies that provide "dynamic and high quality" metal decorating pieces.

Hardick said there were many challenges, including: 

• Registration of all eight printing plates 
• Getting good color and laydown over cold rolled substrates 
• Achieving good application of the backyard green with minimum ghosting while ensuring a sharp reversed type 
• Maintaining consistency run to run.

The pails are found in many national do-it-yourself stores. Akzo Nobel furnished the coatings, INX International supplied the ink and varnish came from The Valspar Corp. Meridian Arts and Graphics prepared prepress work.

Hardick, who will seek other opportunities to display the company's craftsmanship, stressed that the award speaks well of the quality level Cleveland Steel insists upon for all of its customers.

"We're always looking for ways to excel in being the leader in our industry," he said.