Offset Printing - Sheet-Fed

IT'S BEEN said that the small, mom-and-pop commercial printer is going the route of the VCR and the music store—away and out of business. Yes, it's true that consolidation has eroded the small printer base, but we've been hearing about that for 20 years. And there is an abundance of $1 million a year shops still in business; far more of them than there are $50 million performers.

ROLLING MEADOWS, IL—Following on the heels of its Drupa 2008 introduction in Germany, Komori America officially launched the Lithrone SX 40 sheetfed press on Wednesday to a large group of customers, prospects and the trade media. Four short-run jobs on three different paper stocks were demonstrated to illustrate the fast job changeover and reduced paper waste capabilities of the six-color LSX40 press with coater running in Komori's demonstration center here.

ROLLING MEADOWS, IL—Following on the heels of its Drupa 2008 introduction in Germany, Komori America officially launched the Lithrone SX 40 sheetfed press on Wednesday to a large group of customers, prospects and the trade media. Four short-run jobs on three different paper stocks were demonstrated to illustrate the fast job changeover and reduced paper waste capabilities of the six-color LSX40 press with coater running in Komori's demonstration center here.

MADISON, WI—American Printing has acquired The Printing Partners, expanding its offerings into areas such as variable data digital printing and short-run color work. Terms of the deal were not revealed. The entire staff of The Printing Partners will be brought into the fold. American Printing offers a full range of sheetfed printing, distribution and mailing.

Following is a special report from Day 2 of the 2009 Offset and Beyond Conference. Printing Industries of America's Executive Team is reporting from Caesars Palace, where the Conference continues today. What do you do? If your answer is "I am just a printer", you are not likely to be in business much longer in these turbulent times. Tuesday's general session opened with Making the Transformation from Printer to Marketing Communications Provider.

GARY STIFFLER considers himself a good judge of people. A 28-year printing industry veteran, Stiffler’s background includes stints with World Color and Quebecor World. During that time, he also became a shrewd arbiter of talent, appreciating the timber of employees that can enable a company to endure the peaks and valleys of business over the long haul.

CHEVERLY, MD—MOSAIC, a carbon neutral printing company specializing in commercial, digital, UV and waterless printing, has installed the first five-color, 29? KBA Rapida 75 sheetfed press plus aqueous coater in the United States at its facility here. The printer took possession of the press in January 2009. The Rapida 75 features a KBA Densitronic full scanning densitometer and color control system as well as special cooling for waterless printing.

THE WORLD is full of people who grouse about the company they work for, bemoaning the manner in which operations are conducted, and placated by the notion that if they were in charge, things would be done differently. Manny and Jorge Hernandez, who began their respective careers working for other printing companies, could have chosen the grouser tact. But these brothers didn’t just want to be in charge.

IT’S HARD not to automatically view everything through the frame of the current economic climate. In most cases, however, the business challenges companies are struggling with were preexisting conditions that have now been greatly amplified. The trend toward print buyers, at every level, cutting back their order quantities is a case in point.

BIG PICTURE perspective is the ultimate goal of the Web Offset Association’s (WOA) Offset and Beyond Printer-to-Printer Business & Technology Conference. After all, attendees of the printer-driven conference, which takes place May 4-6, 2009, at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, don’t benefit just from talking about web offset, sheetfed offset or even digital printing.