Blogs

After many years of planning sessions, I have concluded that there is a better approach to business analysis than SWOT exercises.

While there are many strategies to protect your business against the ongoing impacts of the pandemic, maintaining liquidity has shown to be key to the survival of many small businesses over the past several months.

Customers are given big incentives to purchase, but often these extras are not sold properly.

This vocational training center offers a great model for addressing the need for skilled entry-level employees.

This could be a good time to learn new skills to be better equipped for the return to “normal.”

We are in uncharted waters. We find ourselves longing for the days of boring sales meetings, live training events, and conferences.

Kodak is flipping the script with the emergence of digital print. We see digital not as a threat, but as a golden opportunity.

Let’s consider some of the most common scenarios that guide a printing company’s decision about a potential inkjet press acquisition.

The new system includes faster-to-market delivery coupled with system development that lowers the cost of production, even as the number of customer SKUs continue to grow. Further, the system includes design tools to minimize expensive trial-and-error. PRINTING United Booths 10564 and 9344.

For business owners, measuring quality and service performance with a tracking system is key to proving quality and keeping customers.

Visibility is the root of some common, unsustainable problems. Ask yourself if you do these things in your production operation.

Employees that have easy access to the “Boss in a Box” can control their business from anywhere, and are equipped to manage themselves.

Let’s look at facts about the agency that’s central to American life – and the largest expense for most magazine publishers.

How much “noise” will be required to have our direct mail marketing offerings heard against this cacophony of digital messages?

Direct mail marketing is a very powerful response driver when used correctly.

As the wide-format inkjet segment has evolved, there have been plenty of examples of both strong and weak brand loyalty for OEMs.

To gain a better view of how one company undertook its digital conversion, Dan Marx spoke with Scott Crosby.

When you decide to enter a new market or provide a new service, you need to promote it and educate your customers.

The centerpiece was the virtual debut of a new, dry-toner digital press: the SX30000, a B2-format, continuous-feed device from Xeikon.

The imagePRESS C850 offers print speeds of up to 85 letter-size images per minute, duplex, long-sheet printing, and can handle heavier, coated or textured stock. The imagePRESS C850 also features in-line finishing options including creasing and trimming. PRINTING United Booth 7016.

Xerox recently unveiled the Iridesse. Now that the glitter has settled, there are a few questions to explore about its possibilities.

Here are some ideas to elevate your customers’ message using affordable print embellishment options.

One area where Color Ink has excelled is offering customers digital print enhancement and embellishment options.

A growing opportunity for PSPs is offering digital printing that is embellished or enhanced with special effects.

We are in uncharted territory, much as we were in previous economic downturns, but now is a good time to cleanse customer data.

What will be so different in this ever-changing world, and how can marketers better prepare ourselves for the new world?

Here are eight, or maybe nine, not quite so obvious magazine publishing predictions that will help you prepare for the year ahead.

This blog explores some tips to “close the loop” on color, examines the benefits, and explains why this trend is on the rise.

Gina Ferrara digs deeper into her research with Madison Advisors on color migration and digital delivery.

The use of CMYK+ is poised for moderate page volume growth, based on several factors.

Lack of information can cause designers to miss out on exploiting new technologies or create unnecessary expense.

Slowing down and following a "Best Practices" method to paper trials and qualification will save you time and ink costs by focusing on ink and paper surface compatibility. As your cost for a better inkjet paper and print quality go up, your ink usage should go down. But only if there are best practices in place.

The fifth housing station in the upgraded Xerox 800i/1000i series can now also deliver metallic inks: gold and silver.

The last couple of times we discussed how paper and then finishing can enhance your direct mail ROI, now let’s look at coatings.

The new, high-gloss printable laminate film from Nobelus offers scratch-resistance and can be used for gluing, foil stamping, UV coating and more. It is intended for direct mail, magazines, folding cartons and other applications. PRINTING United Booth 10141.

We have seen lots of advances in adhesives for bookbinding over the years, with PUR (polyurethane reactive) adhesive being the last major game changer. But there is now a revived interest in protein-based adhesives.

This holiday season marketers are leveraging augmented reality to drive both consumer engagement and purchases; some include print.

Marketers are targeting smartphone owners through mobile marketing techniques such as QR codes, blending print with digital.

Barbara Pellow shares a story of a PSP that used Clickable Paper to deliver an omni-channel experience to a professional sports team.

Getting involved early enough in customers’ brochure planning process gives print providers an opportunity to serve as advisors.

Paper stock is a great tool to create direct mail that enhances your ROI, and come up with a strategy to get attention.

At the beginning of 2019, buyers of publication grades will be paying about 25% more for paper than they did just 18 months earlier.

HP’s Indigo 12000 HD system is increasingly being used for applications such as professional and wedding photo prints. The system’s high-definition writing head doubles print resolution and outperforms the quality of most offset printing. PRINTING United Booth 6407.

What follows is an interview with Rosemarie Breske Garvey, VP at Blooming Color in Lombard, Ill. Blooming Color is doing some pretty spectacular work beyond traditional four-color printing and I wanted to learn more.

Dscoop is part tradeshow and part education event, with an agenda that included A-List keynotes and mentalist Lior Suchard as emcee. The sessions were the expected array of customer success stories, successful selling solutions and product reviews, but there were also a variety of sessions covering finishing, packaging and 3D printing.

Heidelberg’s Speedmaster XL 106-5 press is the machine of choice for a Canadian sheetfed printer: Its integrated LED drying technology gives companies additional product options, as well as a way to access higher-margin printing opportunities. PRINTING United Booth 10143.

Citing the need to increase capacity and gain a competitive advantage, the perfecting press from RMGT was the perfect choice for a growing business. This and other solutions from the company will be represented in Dallas. PRINTING United Booth 9551.

OK, I digress from my usual finishing tech. discussion this week. Although I’m on the digital finishing side, I spent enough time in the high-volume offset world to become quite familiar with publication, periodical and catalog production.

Don Piontek shares some of the diverse finishing applications and systems he’s come across in his career.

During a recent trade show, Don Piontek looked for the newest finishing technology and he found innovations in mechanical binding.

In the search for new finishing developments, Don Piontek received a LinkedIn press release alert on something called “Vpaper.”