Quick Printing

Prior to this year’s AIIM/On Demand show in Philadelphia, some signs pointed to a lukewarm event. Good hotel rooms were available later than usual. The show floor was smaller. Pre-show excitement seemed subdued. That’s why it was a pleasant surprise to walk into the show on Tuesday morning and find substantial crowds milling around the various vendor exhibits. This enthusiasm held up for the first two days and then, as usually happens at a printing trade show, evaporated on the last day. Vendor gripes–a staple at most shows–were at a minimum. Even better, people were buying stuff. Our booth neighbor, Graphic Whizard, sold every piece of equipment they brought to the show and took orders for more.

The same couldn’t be said for the AIIM half of the event. At times that section was virtually devoid of traffic, which is odd since the software side of things is so vital in today’s environment.

There were a few hot new product introductions on the digital output side. The Xerox Color 800/1000 fits neatly into the space above the Color 700 and below the iGen. The Konica Minolta bizhub PRESS C8000 drew attention, as did the light production 105 cpm monochrome imageRUNNER Advance 8000 series from Canon. In talking with several industry analysts, the consensus was that the digital production competition has been narrowed to Canon, Xerox, Konica Minolta, and Ricoh, with Kodak trailing the pack.

Of particular interest to our market segment, Canon crowed at length about its new deal (along with HP) with FedEx Office to place some 12,000 digital output devices in the former FedEx Kinko’s system. The new machines will displace mainly Xerox units.

One unsettling bit of news, at least to me, was the announcement that On Demand will move to Washington, DC, next year. I like the city and have family there, but it has been my experience that DC is not a great venue for such shows. Oh well, my brother tells me they have opened a brand new German beer garden there with 27 German beers on tap, so DC might be okay after all.

I started out my journalism career in newspapers many years ago. Back then, newspapers seemed vibrant and healthy. I thought a career in newspapers promised interesting assignments, the opportunity for advancement, and a secure future. Obviously, my timing was off. After a couple of years, Gannet folded the evening newspaper I worked for. I was offered a part-time position on Gannet’s morning paper in the same city, but that didn’t pay enough to feed the dogs so I took another path and went into magazines.

My magazine career has been, to say the least, varied. I ran the United Mine Workers Journal for a couple of years, until the guy who hired me was voted out of office. Then I was an assistant editor at the Journal of Forestry until I got heartily sick of juried publications. After knocking around for a couple of years doing freelance work, I wound up at Quick Printing and have been here ever since.

Throughout my journalism career, I have been saddened by the demise of so many publications, whether newspapers or magazines. Even when Instant and Small Commercial Printer folded it was a little poignant—even though it was satisfying to be the survivor of that head-to-head battle. I got that same feeling when it was announced that Graphic Arts Monthly was being shut down. We have outlasted another rival, but another publication has bitten the dust.

But, after a brief moment of reflection, it’s time to get back to work to make sure we never join the ranks of the dearly departed. Hope to see you at the On Demand show or somewhere else down the road.

I just got back from the ISA sign show in Orlando. I hadn’t attended the show until this year so I don’t have a long-term perspective but I do know moods when I am around them and the mood there was pretty upbeat. Also, the energy level was as high as I have seen lately – that is until this year.

Of course, this is not a traditional printing trade show. ISA, the International Sign Association, draws both large and grand format ink-jet and digital vendors along with vendors of hard signage such as LED, neon, backlit, etc. By contrast, its rival, SGIA, draws digital and ink-jet vendors along with traditional screen printers. That said, the crossover with these two associations and our industry segment is pretty obvious – digital output and small business operations.

At last year’s Print 09, things were pretty gloomy. Both attendees and vendors seemed worn down and apprehensive. The mood was glum and the energy low. But since then things have been looking up. Dscoop in February was highly dynamic. The PostNet conference in March was also high-energy. This month, EFI Connect’s April 19 event is a sell-out. Are we seeing a trend here? I certainly hope so. Next week’s On Demand show will be another test, but I really get the feeling that the clouds may be lifting, and that is a welcome development.

The conventional wisdom is that the quick printing industry has its roots in the AB Dick offset duplicator and the Xerox copier. We have certainly come a long way since then. From down and dirty to digital workflow, the quick and small commercial printing industry segment has evolved with the times and the technology. During that evolution, offset printing has remained a mainstay even as some of its contributions have declined.

In the 2000 Quick Printing Franchise Review, single-color offset accounted for 14.4% of sales. That dropped to 4% in this year’s survey. Multi-color offset also declined as a percent of sales, although not as drastically. It fell from 19.3% of sales to 17.8%. Meanwhile, four-color offset doubled from 4.3% of sales to 8.3% of sales.

The driver behind those changes is digital technology. Black-and-white offset was the first major victim of the digital age when such jobs migrated to monochrome copier/printers. Two- and three-color offset managed to hang in due to run lengths, quality concerns, and color click charges. Four-color offset grew to fulfill requirements for longer run lengths and quality.

CTP has certainly helped offset to hang in, as have advances in press automation and capabilities. The question is, what role will offset continue to play as digital technology answers quality and run-length questions and new output technology such as inkjet enters the fray?

Morning world!

Want to throw you in on a discussion I was having with some business owners and it’s about why most of us don’t want more sales. Here we go…

Allow me to add a thought.

Most of us DON’T WANT MORE SALES. Sure, we’d like more sales, but we don’t need it. WHY? If we really needed it, we’d be doing something about it.

You hit on the great disconnect that I have been working on the past few months. Selling does not appear to me to be personally meaningful to many business owners. It’s like weather. Love to have nice weather, but hey, it’s snowing and we deal the hand we are dealt eh? Actually, we do MORE about weather – like shovel the snow than we do about selling.

But selling, hum. Most intellectually agree that they need more sales BUT there’s so much to do as a business owner that we constantly find something else that is more important and never FIND the time to do something about it. That’s classic Role Rejection thinking in Sales Call Reluctance.

So, once again you are right – it is about clearly seeing the goal FIRST. Unfortunately most give short shrift (brief and inconsiderate or unsympathetic treatment) to clearly seeing it and that is BECAUSE WE ARE NOT GOAL DRIVEN.

Again, many intellectually BELIEVE they are goal drive but they are not. They’ve done the same old, same old for so long that it doesn’t matter what you do (like make sales calls), the results are going to be the same anyway.

What to do? Snap out of it. Realize that the vast majority of producers and achievers set a personally meaningful goal as the first step. So, decide what you want to be when you grow up and go do it! Unfortunately that’s the seminar response and that is very hard to do.

Try this – what personally meaningful goal (change) can you accomplish this week? Spend an hour soul searching. Nothing big. Something small.

Can be as simple as cleaning out the office, renewing acquaintances with three old customers or doing one item off your action plan. Whatever. It just has to be something you decide you will do THIS WEEK.

Set a goal and then do it.

When you do, you will feel good about yourself. It’s addictive.

Then do it again next week. Do it every week.

As you gain confidence, expand your goals.

ONLY ONCE WE ARE GOAL ORIENTED (acting upon the steps necessary to meet the goal; not just talking about it) will we be able to set personally meaningful goals (spend New Year’s in Mexico with the family) and connect immediate tasks (making sales calls) to the goal.

Otherwise, we end up giving lip service to the concept and end up with limp action plans: I will make five sales calls a week this coming six months – I promise I will really do it this time.

Anyway, thanks for bringing up the subject. Gotta go make some sales happen now.