From the Editor: ACUP Reflections

I’m writing this from my gate at the airport, waiting for a delayed flight home from Cincinnati, where I spent the past four days attending the Association of College and University Printers conference. This was my 22nd ACUP, so I’ve seen some big changes to the group, from a loosely organized gathering coordinated each year by the manager who agreed to host, to an official nonprofit association with bylaws, elections and paid keynote speakers.

In the Cincinnati airport, writing this very column while waiting for my flight.

While ACUP’s days seemed numbered back in 2009 when it had to cancel its conference due to low registration, the association has rebounded nicely. About 110 managers showed up in Cincinnati this year, a 20% jump over last year’s attendance. They included 34 first-time attendees, who seemed to pick up the group’s enthusiasm right away.

I was involved in three different sessions this year. I presented new IPG data on wide-format printing trends at colleges and universities before introducing a trio of managers, who discussed innovative wide-format projects they have done at their schools. I also moderated a panel where managers presented their success stories.

But the session that seemed to engender the most enthusiasm was the one where I interviewed Chuck Werninger, of Houston Independent School District, via Skype. Chuck was unable to attend ACUP, so to keep his session on the agenda, I suggested bringing him there with Skype, which worked great.

Interviewing Chuck Werninger via Skype from his office in Houston.

With his face filling the screen in front of the room, Chuck answered questions about his in-plant’s new Océ VarioPrint i300 sheetfed inkjet press. He detailed his rationale for installing an inkjet press, the types of work it produces, the quality of the printed pieces and numerous other issues. He also took questions from the audience, all of whom seemed glued to his every word. Though a handful of higher-ed in-plant managers have attended the Inkjet Summit (and are planning to attend this year), for the most part, production inkjet technology has not been closely followed by college and university in-plants, so this session was a great introduction for many of them.

Roundtable discussions.

Of course there were many other great ACUP sessions, covering shop justification, marketing, reporting to management, mailing, Web-to-print, and so much more. The roundtable discussions on the last day were boisterous with talk of garment printing, shredding, employee development and other topics.

The conference ended with a tour of the University of Cincinnati’s in-plant operations, proudly shown off by John Wesseling. His shop has two locations, one for offset and another for digital, wide-format and garment printing.

John Wesseling welcomes the ACUP group to the University of Cincinnati.

While in Cincinnati, I also paid a visit to Western and Southern Financial Group’s in-plant, where Manager John Bartik stayed late to show me around. His operation boasts a four-color Heidelberg as well as some robust digital capabilities in its Ricoh and Xerox equipment and its Océ ColorWave 700 wide-format printer.

Though the weather stayed nice for the whole conference, storms around the country have cancelled and delayed the flights of most departing attendees. I see that mine just got delayed another hour. So I guess this waiting area will be my office today.