Profiles of Printing Companies Cited as the Best Workplaces in the Industry

By Erik Cagle

Other Measures of Being the Best

Ever notice how it’s the small things that can make or break your day? Well, when it comes to perks offered by employers, the same thing holds true. In an era when just having a job can be seen as a major coup, it doesn’t take a 10 percent bump at the annual review to get the blood pumping (though that would help).

Let’s sweep up some of the minor perks and the disjointed stories that make working for these “Best Workplace” printers a joy.

Suttle-Straus employees, which enjoy those interest-free loans for the purchase of a new computer (payroll then deducts during the period of a year to pay back), can also take advantage of free checking through the employer’s bank.

Vox Printing’s David Reid, in recounting how his firm has been on a roll in terms of injury-free days, received a phone call from his workman’s comp insurance representative. The insurance carrier assumed there was a problem, since it hadn’t heard from Vox in so long.

“They thought they messed up on something and wanted to see if they could make things right,” Reid says. “We hadn’t had anyone with an injury in six months.”

The safety manager at Malloy Inc. initiated a program where it produced posters—designed by employees—to promote safety. The posters are personal pictures of employees doing activities that they like, with a tagline that essentially said “work safe, and you’ll get to do the things you love.” One employee did a poster based on tornado safety, making it look like a trailer out of the movie “Twister,” and it won a PIA award.

Hopkins Printing CEO Jim Hopkins is proud of the fact that his company is 100 percent employee-owned (ESOP). Workers begin earning stock in the firm after one year of service, and company profits are used to fund the stock accounts. A total of $1.5 million has been contributed to the employees’ accounts during the past two years.

“Our employees are going to have fantastic retirement accounts,” Hopkins says. “And, unlike the stock market, we can all control what happens within the walls of our company.”

Why should anyone want to work for your firm? Sure, it's a buyer's market, with nationwide unemployment still hovering around 9 percent. Even now, however, printers can still be heard lamenting the lack of quality, skilled employees, and perhaps we can attribute that to the top performers happy with where they work, what they're doing and how much they're getting paid.

Instead of following a “take it or leave it” stance to employment, there is a select group of companies in the printing industry that take an aggressive approach to offering working terms and conditions that attract and keep valued employees. Many of these firms refer to themselves as families, and as well they should, given that many of these teams have been together for decades. One printer proudly pointed out that her company allows parents to bring their sick children into work rather than making the worker burn a personal day, then admitted that virtually all of the employees’ children are now grown, and some of the offspring have joined the firm. Now, that’s a low turnover rate.

A common denominator was found among these companies, which were culled, in part, from the Printing Industries of America's 2010 Best Workplace in the Americas award selections (incidentally, the 2011 selections should be announced this month). Many of them reported that of the handful of people who had left their companies over the years, a fair percentage ended up coming back after realizing that "the grass wasn't greener on the other side."

The Best Workplace selections were based on a number of criteria, including training and development opportunities, recognition and rewards, workplace health and safety, health and wellness, and work/life balance. We have randomly selected a sampling of these award-winning printers to profile.

How does your shop stack up against them? Perhaps they will provide inspiration, and a few good ideas, to help make your printing company an occupational destination as opposed to a port en route to somewhere else.

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Printing’s Best Workplaces : The Cream of the Crop