The following is a guest blog post from Kevin Cooper, author of Lean Printing: Cultural Imperatives to Success and coauthor of Lean Printing: Pathway to Success and Setup Reduction for Printers. We live in tumultuous times. We have all been taught since our earliest years that change is a constant, things change, the only constant is change, and probably many other pithy little sayings on the topic of change. With all of the focus that has been put on change it is still remarkable how difficult it is for organizations, and people, to enact and embrace change. Part of this relates to fear. Change is stressful. It takes energy to change something. Change takes focus and effort, we must do something differently. We all know this instinctively but that does not make it easier to do. Want to lose weight? You must change your exercise or eating behavior. Want to save more for retirement? The answer lies in changing your spending or saving habits. Easy to say, tougher to do. Many printers have learned about the concept of Lean management over the past few years. Few printers have been successful to any great degree in implementing Lean principles. The lack of success in the industry is not because Lean is difficult to understand or because Lean has not been proven to be applicable. The biggest impediment to Lean success for printers lies in a desire to implement Lean principles without being willing to undertake the change necessary for sustainable success. Lean is not a set of tools to layer on top of how you already do business. Lean is a fundamentally different way of managing your business. Being Lean means doing things differently than you currently do. Being Lean means changing the way you do things and that is no easier than losing weight or altering your spending habits late in life. We all yearn for the magic pill that makes problems disappear. It does not exist. Change takes effort and hard work. Want to be Lean and improve your business? It is time to...

The following is a guest blog post from Kevin Cooper, author of Lean Printing: Cultural Imperatives to Success and coauthor of Lean Printing: Pathway to Success and Setup Reduction for Printers. We live in tumultuous times. We have all been taught since our earliest years that change is a constant, things change, the only constant is change, and probably many other pithy little sayings on the topic of change. With all of the focus that has been put on change it is still remarkable how difficult it is for organizations, and people, to enact and embrace change. Part of this relates to fear. Change is stressful. It takes energy to change something. Change takes focus and effort, we must do something differently. We all know this instinctively but that does not make it easier to do. Want to lose weight? You must change your exercise or eating behavior. Want to save more for retirement? The answer lies in changing your spending or saving habits. Easy to say, tougher to do. Many printers have learned about the concept of Lean management over the past few years. Few printers have been successful to any great degree in implementing Lean principles. The lack of success in the industry is not because Lean is difficult to understand or because Lean has not been proven to be applicable. The biggest impediment to Lean success for printers lies in a desire to implement Lean principles without being willing to undertake the change necessary for sustainable success. Lean is not a set of tools to layer on top of how you already do business. Lean is a fundamentally different way of managing your business. Being Lean means doing things differently than you currently do. Being Lean means changing the way you do things and that is no easier than losing weight or altering your spending habits late in life. We all yearn for the magic pill that makes problems disappear. It does not exist. Change takes effort and hard work. Want to be Lean and improve your business? It is time to...

The following is a guest blog post from Malcolm Keif, Cal Poly, coauthor of Lean Printing: Pathway to Success and Setup Reduction for Printers.   Recently a great video has been circulating around social media showing a Formula 1 pit stop from the 1950s in contrast to a pit stop from 2013. (If you haven’t seen it, check it out here) In this two minute video you’ll see how radically pit stops have evolved in sixty years. It is fascinating how the sport has changed in technologies, processes, personnel, tools, metrics, and attitudes. We have seen similar changes in the printing industry over as many decades. Printing technology has improved tremendously, especially from the standpoint of process control. Even with makereadies, equipment manufacturers have done a great job of focusing on quick-changeover improvements. CIP4, servo technology, inline register and color control, and many other improvements have brought printing into a science. However, in some ways the entire printing system (all interdependent processes working together), including our material staging, methodology for changing plates and inks, use of strategic personnel, as well as our sense of urgency about the makeready, are more similar to the 1950s version than the 2013 version. How often do we rehearse a makeready…or even discuss a strategic approach, for that matter? Those of us who are lean proponents liken the pit stop to a press or bindery makeready, mostly because it speaks to where crucial seconds can be picked up in a competition. We acknowledge that no progress is being made to reaching the finish line when the car is in the pits. It is not a value-add process, though it is necessary to keep the car running. Isn’t that true of a makeready? It is not a value-add process…but it is necessary to complete the job. So, why not approach a makeready with the same strategy and urgency as a Formula 1 pit stop? The best way to improve makereadies in a company is through an intentional human development approach (education and training). It should also be part of a larger lean thinking initiative. You are really teaching your employees how to think lean. It involves reiterating your vision about value-add and providing the tools your employees need to rethink the makeready. It is simple, but not easy. Our tendencies are to do things the way we have always done them, even when we get new equipment – it may be faster on the racetrack but just as slow in the pits. Let’s face it, if a Formula 1 team came to a race with 1950s pit stop strategies, they couldn’t possibly finish anything but last. Why then do we sometimes approach makereadies with those...

The following is a guest blog post from Malcolm Keif, Cal Poly, coauthor of Lean Printing: Pathway to Success and Setup Reduction for Printers.   Recently a great video has been circulating around social media showing a Formula 1 pit stop from the 1950s in contrast to a pit stop from 2013. (If you haven’t seen it, check it out here) In this two minute video you’ll see how radically pit stops have evolved in sixty years. It is fascinating how the sport has changed in technologies, processes, personnel, tools, metrics, and attitudes. We have seen similar changes in the printing industry over as many decades. Printing technology has improved tremendously, especially from the standpoint of process control. Even with makereadies, equipment manufacturers have done a great job of focusing on quick-changeover improvements. CIP4, servo technology, inline register and color control, and many other improvements have brought printing into a science. However, in some ways the entire printing system (all interdependent processes working together), including our material staging, methodology for changing plates and inks, use of strategic personnel, as well as our sense of urgency about the makeready, are more similar to the 1950s version than the 2013 version. How often do we rehearse a makeready…or even discuss a strategic approach, for that matter? Those of us who are lean proponents liken the pit stop to a press or bindery makeready, mostly because it speaks to where crucial seconds can be picked up in a competition. We acknowledge that no progress is being made to reaching the finish line when the car is in the pits. It is not a value-add process, though it is necessary to keep the car running. Isn’t that true of a makeready? It is not a value-add process…but it is necessary to complete the job. So, why not approach a makeready with the same strategy and urgency as a Formula 1 pit stop? The best way to improve makereadies in a company is through an intentional human development approach (education and training). It should also be part of a larger lean thinking initiative. You are really teaching your employees how to think lean. It involves reiterating your vision about value-add and providing the tools your employees need to rethink the makeready. It is simple, but not easy. Our tendencies are to do things the way we have always done them, even when we get new equipment – it may be faster on the racetrack but just as slow in the pits. Let’s face it, if a Formula 1 team came to a race with 1950s pit stop strategies, they couldn’t possibly finish anything but last. Why then do we sometimes approach makereadies with those...

The following blog post was contributed by Kathryn Wyckoff, Marketing Coordinator at DME, Rob Carll, Director of Sales and Marketing at DME. Sales organizations are always looking for new and innovative ways to sell to current and potential customers. Marketing, of course, is a huge part of the selling process. But yesterday’s one-size-fit-all communication plan no longer resonates with Boomers or Generation X, Y, or Z. Savvy marketers are continually realizing the increasing ROI benefits of individualized and personalized communications. The marketplace is showing that sixty-three-year-old Fred is interested in different product benefits than forty-five-year-old Sharon, and twenty-two-year-old Chloe comes from a different world completely.  This evolution toward targeted, one-to-one messaging has the printing industry scrambling to catch up. Think about it … we now live in a world that allows us to have it our way in almost every aspect of our lives. The courtship between a business and an individual is no different. In fact, studies show that people expect advertisements to be targeted to them or they are likely looking elsewhere. In fact, 74% of consumers get frustrated when content appears to have nothing to do with their interests (Source: Janrain & Harris Interactive). You may know this in theory or from personal preference. So how does one put targeted messaging into practice? This is where variable-data printing comes into play. Traditional offset printers have always been able to add a personalized address label onto a static mail piece. Black laser overprint allows us to add a little more personalization. But how do you then take personalization to the next level? After all, that’s what marketers, and ultimately the buying public, are asking for. The solution is to personalize customer engagement with unique variable data. As you know, the high-level overview of variable-data printing is that a printer uses technology to drive the printing process. Using VDP software, a printed piece can now contain variable information in the form of different content and graphics. This eliminates the need for massive runs and makes it more economical to print truly individualized pieces. Likewise, VDP software can extend into automating the workflow and billing processes, thus eliminating the cost associated with these processes. These points alone are reason enough for a printer to invest in this technology, but what is a way to position it to a fulfillment customer? One way VDP technology can be utilized to its fullest potential is to have website visitors fill out a form for more information regarding the product or service. Within this form, the company not only finds out personal identifiers (name, address, etc.) but also requests a little more information on the visitor. The more you ask the more you...

The following blog post was contributed by Kathryn Wyckoff, Marketing Coordinator at DME, Rob Carll, Director of Sales and Marketing at DME. Sales organizations are always looking for new and innovative ways to sell to current and potential customers. Marketing, of course, is a huge part of the selling process. But yesterday’s one-size-fit-all communication plan no longer resonates with Boomers or Generation X, Y, or Z. Savvy marketers are continually realizing the increasing ROI benefits of individualized and personalized communications. The marketplace is showing that sixty-three-year-old Fred is interested in different product benefits than forty-five-year-old Sharon, and twenty-two-year-old Chloe comes from a different world completely.  This evolution toward targeted, one-to-one messaging has the printing industry scrambling to catch up. Think about it … we now live in a world that allows us to have it our way in almost every aspect of our lives. The courtship between a business and an individual is no different. In fact, studies show that people expect advertisements to be targeted to them or they are likely looking elsewhere. In fact, 74% of consumers get frustrated when content appears to have nothing to do with their interests (Source: Janrain & Harris Interactive). You may know this in theory or from personal preference. So how does one put targeted messaging into practice? This is where variable-data printing comes into play. Traditional offset printers have always been able to add a personalized address label onto a static mail piece. Black laser overprint allows us to add a little more personalization. But how do you then take personalization to the next level? After all, that’s what marketers, and ultimately the buying public, are asking for. The solution is to personalize customer engagement with unique variable data. As you know, the high-level overview of variable-data printing is that a printer uses technology to drive the printing process. Using VDP software, a printed piece can now contain variable information in the form of different content and graphics. This eliminates the need for massive runs and makes it more economical to print truly individualized pieces. Likewise, VDP software can extend into automating the workflow and billing processes, thus eliminating the cost associated with these processes. These points alone are reason enough for a printer to invest in this technology, but what is a way to position it to a fulfillment customer? One way VDP technology can be utilized to its fullest potential is to have website visitors fill out a form for more information regarding the product or service. Within this form, the company not only finds out personal identifiers (name, address, etc.) but also requests a little more information on the visitor. The more you ask the more you...