Print is variable, personalized, and produced on demand. For any print run to be worthwhile, it must own up to the cost of production and mailing.

In our September/October issue, Digital Publishing Solutions investigated digital color production presses and asked major vendors to share insight on the best equipment for a given print operation. This research indicates that the quantity of printed output produced is not decreasing as some anticipated. Instead, the quality of digital press technology is nearng that of offset, with the additional benefit of increasing speeds and a variety of other new features, such as inline finishing.

Commercial print shops find success by offering variable, on demand services. Enterprises save time and money as they incorporate marketing and other print services in-house. The past few issues of Digital Publishing Solutions highlight editorial discussing digital print technology and the choices available, now we profile a number of print operations successfully using digital print technology in a range of environments.

Digital Production Shifts
Print service providers of all forms predict future growth shifts in the digital print space. "We see digital print as the only viable option for our customers," explains Denis P. Sovik, partner, The Ready Group. The company is located in Pembroke, MA, with an approximate annual revenue of seven million dollars. The Ready Group uses its nine Konica Minolta bizhub PRO C6500s to create interactive direct-to-consumer marketing for automotive retailers.

Sovik says the ability to speak to individuals through targeted direct mail—based on unique data that The Ready Group compiles on recepient’s buying habits—propels their clients beyond traditional print. "Combined with our personalized URL (pURL) technology, we drive higher responses, capture data on-the-fly, and turn the new data into even more effective direct marketing or e-marketing campaigns," continues Sovik. "We see digital as nothing but a growth vertical with emerging technology applications. Our hope is to see the cost fall more in line with large run offset pricing, given that the quality is almost even at this point," Sovik adds.

The only direction to go is up, it seems; predictions of growth in digital production print prevail. "We will see two major events in the digital color marketplace over the next 24 months; the first being the entry and adoption of continuous-roll color laser that offers the quality and cost structure to compete with cut sheet quality," states Brent Tartar, senior VP of sales and marketing, W.A. Wilde. "Second is the continued surge of digital color printing combined with lower costs," he adds.

W.A. Wilde, a family owned and operated marketing services provider, celebrating its 140-year anniversary. The company, whose 2007 revenue totaled over $58 million, offers a full suite of solutions, including creative and agency services, interactive technologies, digital print and digital publishing, database management, fulfillment, distribution, and mailing. Wilde’s clients span the financial service, insurance, retail, publishing, pharmaceutical, and technology markets.

The company operates three sales offices in MA, OH, and OR, in addition to and four production facilities, including a new 130,000 square-foot facility in Holliston, MA, which houses fulfillment and variable digital printing operations. Four Xerox iGen3 color printers run three shifts, five days a week and select shifts on weekends. Tartar says Wilde’s production presses run complex variable marketing communications to support ongoing programs, including transactional statements, new customer acquisition, product renewals, program enrollment materials, and customized publications.

"Our roots are in the traditional services that support high-volume mail campaigns," says Tartar. "However, today we leverage that experience to deliver groundbreaking new direct marketing initiatives—like data-driven, one-to-one communications and programs that seamlessly integrate across traditional and electronic media," he adds.

Tartar says consumer behavior stimulates the adoption of digital color printing. "Consumer behavior is driving these surges as they ask to be communicated to in a more personalized, multi-channel way. We see that with the current client programs we support and those we are currently solving for."

On Target
Direct Group is a fully integrated direct marketing solutions provider with four locations in NJ and a customer service center in MD. The company’s Swedesboro, NJ, site is one of the world’s largest-volume, single-site, commercial mailing operations, producing about 140 million pieces of mail per month. The $140 million company employs over 1,200 and processes over 1.5 billion mail pieces each year.

Don McKenzie, president and CEO, Direct Group, also sees the growth in digital production printing. This corresponds with a growing desire for targeted, personalized communications. "There is a major transformation from mass-based, large-volume mailings to more targeted and persoalized communications that leverage color and variability in imaging to offer more efficient direct mail pieces that work harder for these marketing firms," says McKenzie. "We believe that the addition of color and the ability to much finer targeting of personalization leads itself to better response rates."

McKenzie notes that return on investment (ROI) is ultimately what customers want, and with personalized, digital production printing and marketing guidance, Direct Group helps its clients achieve higher ROI.

"At the end of the day you certainly want the lowest cost per thousand. In today’s marketplace, customers really want a better response per thousand," says McKenzie. "If we can help them make better decisions—on who to target, who to communicate with, what offers make sense, and when and how much color and variability to add—then we’re playing a much different role," he adds.

McKenzie says Direct Group is in turn, "not just a production firm but a source that helps build campaigns that are effective, drive greater readership response, and enhance response rates."

In addition to purchasing 32 Océ VarioStream 8750s in May, Direct Group is the first installation site for the Océ JetStream 2200 full-color, high-speed inkjet printer. The purchases mark a full company conversion to the Océ platform. McKenzie credits speed as one of the reasons for the purchase. "When you produce 140 million pieces in a month, speed is very important. A cutsheet environment does not make sense for our client base, which is high-volume financial services," he adds. By running at 500 feet per minute, the JetStream allows Direct Group to leverage variability in color and the ability to combine it with speed. "It allows us to balance speed with 600 dpi capability and the ability to use non-specialized or treated paper. That’s a breakthrough for us. It allows us to be price competitive," McKenzie adds.

The Direct Group’s clients are not only looking for variability and color, but also efficiency and cost. "When you look at this equipment it’s making a transformation from a printing press to data processing equipment," he says of the Océ JetStream 2200. "A firm like ours has very strong skills sets in data management. The JetStream allows us to leverage those skills and move into the digital environment. We understand targeting; we understand modeling; and we understand predicting; we understand the combination of data, production, and postal efficiency."

The Full Solutions Provider
Fulfillment Partners Millennium Market-ing Group, a company based in Orlando, FL, offers a 30-year track record as a full service solutions provider. "We are not just a print and mail service provider. We are a solutions provider," states Frank Craig, president and CEO, Fulfillment Partners Millennium Marketing Group.

High-profile customers, from AAA to Anheuser-Busch, Publix Super Markets, and Walt Disney, have longstanding relationships with Fulfillment Partners Millennium Marketing Group. "We use fulfillment services, direct mail production, list procurement, list management, B&W and four-color variable digital print, wide format digital printing, data processing and computer programming, Internet and Web site applications, and email broadcasting to provide successful solutions to the communication and fulfillment challenges of our clients," says Craig.

The company took its first step into on demand digital color with the purchase of a 65 page per minute (ppm) Konica Minolta bizhub PRO C6500 with an EFI Fiery RIP. "Knowing that the industry was—and, still is—moving toward digital print on demand and variable four-color imaging, we felt that direction was inevitable," explains Craig. "The challenge was figuring out a way to do cautiously approach it."

The company then added a Xerox DocuColor 6060 with a DocuSP RIP. "This printer was able to produce the same quality as the C6500 while still keeping tight control over monthly overhead," says Craig. With new variable-image, four-color, POD applications and fulfillment projects produced daily, the company soon found the need to add a third printer—a Xerox DocuColor 8000AP with an EFI Fiery-8000 RIP.

Craig is pleased with his company’s digital print investments. "We know now that we did it right. Many companies jump right in with high-end, expensive digital production presses with no revenue-generating plan. The financial strain of trying to pay the exorbitant monthly overhead on those machines without the consideration of the length of time it would take to learn the new technology and build a revenue stream was more than many of those companies could bear. Of the ones that did survive, many are still struggling while we seem to be flourishing."

The addition of digital keeps Fulfill-ment Partners Millennium Marketing Group up to speed with the latest technology and customer demands. "Pretty much any industry report you read these days shows that the trend is shorter run jobs with quicker turnaround. That means less offset and more digital," notes Craig.

Success isn’t automatic with the purchase of a digital production press, Craig warns. "It’s not just the equipment, it’s what you do with it. "If you take a good look at our business model, you will see that we do many different things here," says Craig. "Digital just happens to be one of them. We use digital to augment our other services and, our other services to augment digital. They complement each other. I think that’s why we’ve been able to succeed where others have failed."

Digital Meets Offset
Digital production printing is indeed growing, but offset maintains its position. Originating in 1934, University of Missouri Printing Services serves the 28,000 students and 14,000 faculty and staff of the University of Missouri, producing a wide range of both digitally and offset printed products from business cards to four-color posters, magazines, and saddle-stitched books.

University of Missouri Printing Services has a main facility with a variety of print and finishing devices, including a B&W Xerox iGen3, a Xerox DocuTech 6180, a six-color 48-inch Heidelberg press, Epson and Hewlett-Packard (HP) large format printers, and a complete bindery operation. In addition, the in-plant shop runs seven satellite operations on campus, called DigiPrint Centers, each equipped with a high speed B&W digital printer. Printing Services’ annual revenue totals $8.2 million and uses an internal charge-back system to bill the university for services.

At Printing Services, both digital and offset printing have a place. "The iGen3 is currently serving our digital color production, and serving it nicely. We’re also an offset printing operation," notes Rick Wise, director, University of Missouri Printing Services. "We feel that by offering both state-of-the-art digital and offset, we’re best serving the University of Missouri. As you know when we get up to whatever the magic number is 10, 15, or 20,000 of a four-color piece, you can save a lot of money by sending it to an offset press. On the other hand, if someone wants 100 brochures today, and maybe 50 more tomorrow, you can’t beat digital. We feel the two technologies really complement each other."

Wise tells us that recently Printing Services focuses its attention on educating its customers on what they can do with digital print. "We’ve been marketing digital color more aggressively lately, and it’s helped. Customers don’t necessarily know, understand, or care about the distinction. The education assures them that they can get a beautiful, four-color piece and have the option to only print ten of them for a reasonable price."

Digital with a Purpose
A paperless world is a blip we hear occasionally, but we know that print is never going to disappear. That is not to say that there is a lack of concern for the environmental sustainability and control of waste. Many companies are on the lookout for solutions that offer more mindful printing.

Denver, CO, National Hirschfeld LLC is over 100 years old, and was formed from a consolidation of three regional printers—C&M Press, National Printing and Packaging, and AB Hirschfeld Press. The company uses a number of printing devices, including a Xerox iGen3, an Océ two-color press, three Xerox DocuTechs, and their newest acquisition, an InfoPrint 5000 press from InfoPrint Solutions Company. Although the book publishing industry is seasonal, Steve Wilson, VP of sales and marketing, National Hirschfeld, says the InfoPrint 5000 currently runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

National Hirschfeld is known for producing monochrome textbooks, and the addition of the InfoPrint 5000 allows them to add a robust, high-speed color option for updating and repurposing textbooks. After speaking with several of its educational publishing clients National Hirschfeld found that, "There is a strong movment towards on demand college textbooks," states Brett Birky, president, National Hirschfeld.

National Hirschfeld does what they call re-binds of college textbooks. "We’ll actually take inventoried college textbooks, take off the cover and the outdated chapters, reprint those text pages, and then print a new cover and rebind the book," says Birky. "The economics behind it make a lot of sense but there’s an environmental aspect to this that is also pretty powerful. We’re only printing what you need when you need it. It’s going to be relevant content, which also means we reduce page counts, weight, and paper consumption. It’s a win-win application all around."

Production Print Success
The words of these commercial and in-plant print professionals illustrate the success and best practices of digital production printing. The evolution of the print service provider into full-on marketing solutions provider is due to the maturation of the technology. New developments, such as Hewlett-Packard’s inkjet web press; Kodak’s MICR ink as well as its 120 ppm S3600 press, set to launch in 2009; Ricoh’s C900; and the new Xerox iGen 4 is something to watch over the next few months.

For more updates on new entries in the digital production press space as well more end-user profiles, visit us online and in upcoming installments of the Digital Publishing Solutions eNewsletter.