Commercial Printing Outlook — Tepid Vote of Confidence

PIA/GATF does not adjust its industry sales growth figures for inflation, in contrast to NAPL, in order to talk in the same terms as printers typically think about their own sales, notes Davis. “There probably is about a percentage point of inflation in those numbers.”

Economic growth slowed considerably in the first quarter of 2007, but then picked up a little faster than Davis anticipated. “If the economy grows at 2.5 to 2.7 percent (as he expects) in 2008, print markets should grow at around 3 percent.”