NPES Third Quarter Equipment Shipments Data--Some Good News, Some Bad

However, somewhat more disturbing is the size of the decline witnessed in the 3rd quarter. As shown in Figure 2, the 9.7% quarter over quarter decline is almost double even the largest quarterly decline of the past three years. This points to the likelihood that print volumes for the 3rd quarter took a stronger negative decline as well. PIA flash data shows traditional lithographic printing was down .7% for the 3rd quarter which one could have expected to be down by a greater margin given the NPES supplies data. This will all become clearer when final 2008 Printing Industries of America and NPES data are released.