Quad Makes It to the Top of the 2016 Morningstar Wisconsin Ticker

Quad/Graphics, headquartered in Sussex, Wis., has made it to the top of the 2016 Morningstar Wisconsin Ticker, which tracks percentage changes in the stock price of Wisconsin's publicly traded companies, with a price change of 189.03%. Quad/Graphics' stock price almost tripled in 2016, to $26.88 per share from $9.30, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

In the past several years, the company has poised itself for growth through investment in its facilities.

Just last month, Quad/Graphics made an announcement of plans to transform its Westampton, N.J., direct marketing production facility into what it's calling a “Digital Print Supercenter that will establish a new standard for personalized, high-response direct marketing solutions.”

The Westampton, N.J., Supercenter complements the company's existing Midwest Digital Print Supercenter in Pewaukee, Wis., which has added an HP Indigo 12000 digital press; and Quad’s Effingham, Ill., direct mail production facility, which recently expanded its personalization capabilities with HP C800 four-color variable inkjet print modules that are consistent with what are in operation at Quad’s Pewaukee, Wis., and Chalfont, Pa., production facilities.

The continued expansion of digital print production capabilities at these plants bolsters Quad’s overall direct marketing platform. The various investments within the Quad/Graphics network also illustrate the company's continued industry migration to digital and hybrid printing platforms in general, and especially to increased customer demands for highly relevant and hyperpersonalized, full-color pieces within the direct mail space.

Making strategic moves, the company is also generating a cash flow, growing its earnings and reducing debt, while paying a dividend, according to the Journal Sentinel. 

“We got through the very heavy lifting period of many years of integrating and consolidating a massive industry, and now we’re seeing the results,” said Chairman, President and CEO Joel Quadracci, in an interview.

Quadracci also said in the interview that the company is evolving with the digital and marketing needs of today's customers. “We are a printer. However, what our customers are asking us — and how they’re asking to participate — is feeling more like an agency as well,” he adds.

Through acquisition in the past six years, the shuttering of 36 plants and continued investment, Quad/Graphics has increased it's sales from $1.8 billion to about $4.6 billion, and it's workforce grew from about 8,600 to more than 20,000 employees, reports the Sentinel.

Quad/Graphics was ranked #2 on the 2016 Printing Impressions 400, the industry’s most comprehensive list of the leading printing companies in the U.S. and Canada ranked by annual sales and has held that position for the past seven years, second only to RR Donnelley.

“Printing, per se, isn’t a high-growth industry, so they’re [Quad/Graphics] broadening their wings,” said John Collopy, director of research for Carl M. Hennig Inc., who tracks Wisconsin stocks.

According to the newspaper, in 2016 only eight of the 59 Wisconsin companies included in the Ticker didn’t see a price increase.