Industry Up-and-Comer: Tyler Jacobson, GLS/NEXT Precision Marketing

Tyler Jacobson, a 23-year-old account executive at GLS / NEXT Precision Marketing in Brooklyn Park, Minn., found his passion for the graphic arts while in high school. His school offered print and graphics classes, and he took all of them, spending most of his free time in the print lab. “I enjoyed making screen-printed shirts and posters, as well as working with design software like Adobe Creative Suite,” Jacobson says. He then took classes on marketing as well, and found he was equally passionate about that side of the business.

So, when Jacobson got to college, choosing his degree was an easy decision. “I found the program Cross-Media Graphics Management (Graphic Communications) at the University of Wisconsin-Stout and it perfectly combined my two passions: printing/graphics and marketing.” He graduated in Spring 2017, and was hired out of college by GLS / NEXT.

Still early in his career, Jacobson spends his days on the sales side of things, prospecting for new work, preparing quotes for current customers and assisting on live jobs as needed. He sees himself continuing in this role for the next few years, working his way up and becoming a more successful salesperson as he goes.

But looking further out, Jacobson sees himself at the top of the sales food chain, perhaps even making the upper management level in the next 10-15 years.

Jacobson loves the fast pace of the print world, noting that “no day is the same atmosphere in printing. I like knowing that one week or day will never be like the last one.”

But, he points out, the industry needs to do a better job of getting the word out about how vibrant a printing career really is. “We need to promote the print and graphics industry to the next generations and change the stigma that print is dead.

“We must expose kids at a younger age to the possibilities the printing industry has to offer,” he stresses. “If we wait until they are a senior in high school, we have already lost them.”

To discover other industry up-and-comers and read their stories, read Industry Up-and-Comers: Foundation for Succession from the April issue of Printing Impressions.