Fast-track Firms — Movin’ On Up
DIFFERENT ROADS can lead to success. Some are straight on, filled with excitement and opportunity. Some are long and winding, wrought with trials and tribulations.
But in the race to printing prosperity, whether firms take the high or low road, or simply the one less traveled, it proves there are multiple avenues to sales growth.
Here’s a sampling of fast-track firms appearing on this year’s Printing Impressions 400.
Synergy Graphics, Plymouth, MN
Most Recent Fiscal Year Sales: $66 Million
Previous Fiscal Year Sales: $20 Million
Change: 230 percent
“Why are we successful?” ponders Mike O’Meara, Synergy Graphics president. “Lots of acquisitions! We were just a little company when we first started out in 1996. We had our niche, doing oddball jobs like diecutting, folding and gluing. Then, we decided to get into printing real estate.”
Over the years, Synergy has acquired several printing, binding, and mailing and fulfillment establishments, including one that’s particularly close to his heart. He calls it his “diamond in the rough.” Synergy Web Graphics is a 380,000-square-foot facility, formerly Mazomanie, WI-based Sunny Industries, which had been shut down. Synergy reopened its doors and got the full-web operation cranked up again.
“Now that operation is the biggest growth area within our company, and we’ve hardly tapped into it yet,” says O’Meara.
While Synergy’s core sheetfed, half- and full-web, and digital printing capabilities continue to grow, two areas of the business are proving to be real money makers. The printer opened a facility in St. Cloud, MN, and it became the Elections Services Group, which prints election ballots and other election materials for up to 20 states. “Next year is a presidential election, and we’ll really be cranking out the ballots.”
Synergy’s mailing and fulfillment operation in Fridley, MN, has also been instrumental in the company’s growth over the past five years. “This business is huge!” exclaims O’Meara. “And it’s getting bigger all the time. In fact, we plan to double our capacity and expand that facility sometime in the future.”
