CATALOG Market -- Recovery Is a Custom Order

Mark Deterding, president of the Banta Catalog Group, also uses the "cautiously optimistic" phrase to describe the outlook for 2004. "We are seeing both page counts and run quantities starting to increase with the up tick in the economy," he explains.

Deterding says it's too early to really speculate as to how quickly business will build. "However, with a strong holiday season in 2003, we would anticipate seeing a much more robust first half of 2004 (compared to the first half of 2003)," he adds.