Paper — Price Hikes Blindside Printers!

"It's the same thing on the cost side—it doesn't take paper prices going up by 15 percent to 20 percent to cause problems," Paparozzi adds. "This is something printers need to be concerned about, even though the upturns are coming from very low levels."

Whether it's a Y2K-induced scare, the result of recovering foreign economies or a manufacturer's ploy to see price levels adhere to a certain scale, the once-predictable and flaccid paper industry merits intense scrutiny for the months to come, particularly the first few months of the new year.