Many people focus on getting off to a good start - making a good first impression is a great example.
Athletes want to get the season started right, but that doesn't always happen. The 2015 Kansas City Chiefs are an example of a team that got off to a bad start, their record was 1-5 after 6 games. Something happened though and they began a 10 game winning streak and finished well.
The Denver Broncos had a good 2015 season, and struggled a few games but what fans of football will remember is that they finished well - playing in the Superbowl! There is already talk about Peyton Manning finishing his career with a Superbowl win - that would be a perfect example of finishing well.
Printing also requires finishing well. I have seen vibrantly colored business cards that were cut crooked - it spoils the look when they aren't cut correctly.
It would be a shame to spend hours on your design and prepress, extra effort on the press and then when the booklet comes out of the bindery equipment it is cut in a wedge shape! Finishing well is extremely important when it comes to a print product.
I've included some video of a booklet maker running - it isn't easy to get the books cut correctly, but with experienced operators it can be done.
Many times the folks who finish a print job also face the toughest deadlines. Regardless of how much time is lost in prepress or the press area, the bindery and finishing folks are always expected to still meet the deadline for completion. These folks perform under time pressure, quality pressure and don't get a lot of recognition for what they accomplish. It takes a special team to work under this pressure and still do a great job.
Great teams get lots of notice in sports - the Superbowl team will probably get an invite to the White House - but the team that gets our papers, booklets and other products out the door on time work in the shadows without much recognition.
Thank you to those who work in our bindery and make the end product look so good!
Friday, January 29, 2016
Friday, January 22, 2016
Relationships: Are you a good friend?
Today I'm breaking away from posts about printing to dive in to another topic that has far reaching implications for our success. Our family, our employment and even our sales efforts are all impacted by our relationships with other people.
I think everyone would agree that having a good relationship in your family is crucial to long term happiness and success at home. Why is that? We realize I think that those who see us the most and know us the best have our best interests in mind...at least at first. If we don't return the focus on our families best interests, a downward spiral begins.
Almost every person who seeks a life partner wants someone who will be honest, even if what they say hurts our feelings, because we want them to guide us to be better. Children can help us understand this principle even more.
When your child is about to get hurt by their actions, whether jumping on the bed where they may fall off, or by making a bad choice that will lead them down a wrong path, we want to help them and encourage them to make the right choice, or stop the actions that will get them hurt. We have their best interests in mind, even though the child may not realize it.
Work relationships can be improved by applying this same idea to our interaction with our coworkers. Instead of routinely showing up for work and "putting in our time", developing good relationships with our coworkers can greatly impact our happiness and success in our career.
When coworkers realize we aren't out to take their job, or to beat them to a promotion, but instead we want to help them succeed, the atmosphere and culture of our work place changes. Stress will be reduced and our work day enjoyed.
Sales people are also a great example of success through good relationships. If you sell your product and then abandon your customer, your long term success will be limited. I don't think a good salesperson is someone who can sell ice to an eskimo. If the customer doesn't really need what you are selling the first time they make a purchase, you can bet they won't buy what you want to sell the next time you visit.
A really great salesperson is someone who develops a trusting relationship with a customer and the customer knows the salesperson has their best interests in mind. These are the relationships that last - even if you change companies, your customer will follow you and buy from the new company you represent because they trust and believe in you. They believe if you made the choice to change companies, then you, as the expert, know what is best for them as well.
Here is a personal example: I once was working to secure some printing from a potential customer. I had submitted aggressive pricing several times over 6 months and the customer even acknowledged my pricing was better, our quality was great but he just couldn't move his printing with us.
Up to this point we had traded emails and a couple of phone calls, but I had never met him in person because he was about 2 hours away. I decided it was time to get to know him better, so I invited him to lunch. I drove the 2 hours each way and bought his lunch. We talked about business and then talked about our families and careers. When lunch was over I didn't ask for his business, I simply said thank you for having lunch. The next week he called me to place his first order. The relationship grew quickly to a $10,000 a month partnership - all from a $40 lunch visit.
So, do you care? Do others see you looking out for their best interests?
Relationships matter, at home, at work and in sales. Be a better friend and I'll bet you'll have better friends as well as success and happiness!
I think everyone would agree that having a good relationship in your family is crucial to long term happiness and success at home. Why is that? We realize I think that those who see us the most and know us the best have our best interests in mind...at least at first. If we don't return the focus on our families best interests, a downward spiral begins.
Almost every person who seeks a life partner wants someone who will be honest, even if what they say hurts our feelings, because we want them to guide us to be better. Children can help us understand this principle even more.
 |
| Me and my daughters |
Work relationships can be improved by applying this same idea to our interaction with our coworkers. Instead of routinely showing up for work and "putting in our time", developing good relationships with our coworkers can greatly impact our happiness and success in our career.
When coworkers realize we aren't out to take their job, or to beat them to a promotion, but instead we want to help them succeed, the atmosphere and culture of our work place changes. Stress will be reduced and our work day enjoyed.
Sales people are also a great example of success through good relationships. If you sell your product and then abandon your customer, your long term success will be limited. I don't think a good salesperson is someone who can sell ice to an eskimo. If the customer doesn't really need what you are selling the first time they make a purchase, you can bet they won't buy what you want to sell the next time you visit.
A really great salesperson is someone who develops a trusting relationship with a customer and the customer knows the salesperson has their best interests in mind. These are the relationships that last - even if you change companies, your customer will follow you and buy from the new company you represent because they trust and believe in you. They believe if you made the choice to change companies, then you, as the expert, know what is best for them as well.
Here is a personal example: I once was working to secure some printing from a potential customer. I had submitted aggressive pricing several times over 6 months and the customer even acknowledged my pricing was better, our quality was great but he just couldn't move his printing with us.
Up to this point we had traded emails and a couple of phone calls, but I had never met him in person because he was about 2 hours away. I decided it was time to get to know him better, so I invited him to lunch. I drove the 2 hours each way and bought his lunch. We talked about business and then talked about our families and careers. When lunch was over I didn't ask for his business, I simply said thank you for having lunch. The next week he called me to place his first order. The relationship grew quickly to a $10,000 a month partnership - all from a $40 lunch visit.
So, do you care? Do others see you looking out for their best interests?
Relationships matter, at home, at work and in sales. Be a better friend and I'll bet you'll have better friends as well as success and happiness!
Friday, January 15, 2016
Newspaper Inserting video
Have you ever opened the newspaper and ended up with flyers and things fall out of it on to the floor? (Made you look, didn't they)
Advertising by putting inserts into a newspaper has been a very popular method of advertising for many years. In fact, at
one time while folks were pulling back on actual ads in the newspaper, insert advertising was growing by leaps and bounds.
Advantages to this type of advertising are numerous. The subscriber gets a stand alone piece they can hang on to and refer back to - especially if you are promoting multiple items on sale. The insert automatically makes people see it, simply because they need to keep them from falling out. The message is all yours - you don't have limited space to communicate, you can make the insert as many pages as you choose. You can be creative with size, color and attention grabbing graphics.
Disadvantages can be it is much more work for you as an advertiser. You typically need to find someone to create this insert - most are not built by the newspaper although they could be. It can take a very long time to create the artwork and copy, send to a printer, then have the printer ship the inserts to the newspapers you want it inserted in to. You may need to plan your sale more than a month in advance and can't change any price points up to 3 weeks before the promotion starts. It is expensive. You pay for design, printing, shipping and inserting. It is typically much cheaper to buy a full page ad in the newspaper than it is to print enough copies to insert into that same paper. You also normally get a discount for placing the same ad multiple times - an insert is not that way.
Because it is such a popular and productive way to advertise, newspapers have machines to make the process of putting inserts in a publication much quicker and easier. If you have 10 inserts and 1,000 copies of your paper in circulation, that is 10,000 pieces to put together!
The Pueblo Chieftain has 2 high speed inserting machines that are computerized to keep track of the inserts being put in. Occasionally an insert doesn't feed correctly - the computer senses a missed insertion and since the machines are round like a carousel, that particular newspaper isn't dropped into the stream of finished papers. it rides around the machine up to 4 times trying to get the correct insert in. If it fails a 5th time the machine stops and lets the operator fix it manually.
The 2 round inserters can put 12 inserts into a paper at one pass. We use both machines to get the Pueblo Chieftain out on the street quicker than we could with only one.
The inserting machines feed papers on to a conveyor that take the newspapers to a stacking machine. The stacker produces bundles of newspapers that are then straightened up by people and stacked on a skid, or sent out the door to be delivered.
If you operate a newspaper you should consider offering inserts - it can add to those difficult to find advertising dollars.
Advertising by putting inserts into a newspaper has been a very popular method of advertising for many years. In fact, at
one time while folks were pulling back on actual ads in the newspaper, insert advertising was growing by leaps and bounds.
Advantages to this type of advertising are numerous. The subscriber gets a stand alone piece they can hang on to and refer back to - especially if you are promoting multiple items on sale. The insert automatically makes people see it, simply because they need to keep them from falling out. The message is all yours - you don't have limited space to communicate, you can make the insert as many pages as you choose. You can be creative with size, color and attention grabbing graphics.
Disadvantages can be it is much more work for you as an advertiser. You typically need to find someone to create this insert - most are not built by the newspaper although they could be. It can take a very long time to create the artwork and copy, send to a printer, then have the printer ship the inserts to the newspapers you want it inserted in to. You may need to plan your sale more than a month in advance and can't change any price points up to 3 weeks before the promotion starts. It is expensive. You pay for design, printing, shipping and inserting. It is typically much cheaper to buy a full page ad in the newspaper than it is to print enough copies to insert into that same paper. You also normally get a discount for placing the same ad multiple times - an insert is not that way.
Because it is such a popular and productive way to advertise, newspapers have machines to make the process of putting inserts in a publication much quicker and easier. If you have 10 inserts and 1,000 copies of your paper in circulation, that is 10,000 pieces to put together!
The Pueblo Chieftain has 2 high speed inserting machines that are computerized to keep track of the inserts being put in. Occasionally an insert doesn't feed correctly - the computer senses a missed insertion and since the machines are round like a carousel, that particular newspaper isn't dropped into the stream of finished papers. it rides around the machine up to 4 times trying to get the correct insert in. If it fails a 5th time the machine stops and lets the operator fix it manually.
The 2 round inserters can put 12 inserts into a paper at one pass. We use both machines to get the Pueblo Chieftain out on the street quicker than we could with only one.
The inserting machines feed papers on to a conveyor that take the newspapers to a stacking machine. The stacker produces bundles of newspapers that are then straightened up by people and stacked on a skid, or sent out the door to be delivered.
If you operate a newspaper you should consider offering inserts - it can add to those difficult to find advertising dollars.
Friday, January 8, 2016
Video: The press in action
The web offset press (rotary press) was invented by William Bullock in 1863. Back then, it was driven by a large belt that turned the press units and paper rolls. The invention transformed the speed with which printing could be done. Newspapers in particular benefited from this great boost in speed. The news could be more timely and more copies could be distributed.
Mr. Bullock unfortunately was killed in 1867 by his own invention. While trying to kick the drive belt on to the pulley, his leg was caught and crushed. He developed gangrene and died during an operation to amputate his leg.
Many improvements both in safety and print speeds have been made over the years. Presses today can print at very fast speeds, some printing newspapers at the rate of 60,000 or more copies per hour.
You may not know, but groups come through the newspaper office frequently for tours. Boy Scouts even have a requirement to tour a newspaper as a step toward a badge. It is interesting to see how the excitements builds as the group moves through the office areas and makes their way to the press room.
There is something about a printing press - the aroma of the ink, the noise of the gears and rollers I suppose - that demands the group's attention.
The production of a newspaper, starting with the stories, headlines, ads and photos is a magical process. The last few steps in the process are amazing. The ends of the press have large rolls of paper turning, the middle of the press has a stream of completed papers coming out - and in between is where the production magic happens.
We'd love to give you a tour, so feel free to contact us today to schedule your chance to see it up close and personal.
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