Penn State’s New Direction

ABBAS BADANI is not afraid to be blunt when talking about his in-plant’s past performance.

“There’s no question that the way it was, wasn’t really working,” says Badani, director of Pennsylvania State University’s Multimedia & Print Center (MPC), in University Park, Pa.

In short, up until a few years ago, the in-plant was still staffed and equipped for 1970s-level production. It was losing business, expenses were rising, and most of the campus viewed it as merely another vendor, not as a core part of the university.

“We were very stagnant, I think, for a while,” notes Mike Poorman, assistant director, who has been with the in-plant for 25 years. “The last year and a half…we definitely have a clear picture on the direction of this unit.”

The in-plant is not out of the red yet, Badani acknowledges, but it’s al­most there. In 2005, the operation improved its bottom line by nearly 60 percent, he says, generating revenues of $12,347,000, including mail.

“By next year we will be fully back to where we need to be,” he says.

The place it needs to be, though, is a place it has never been before.

Redefining a Campus Business

“The unit has to redefine itself going forward,” Badani declares.

That, in a nutshell, is what he’s been trying to do for the past two years since arriving from Texas A&M University, where he was director of Graphics Services.

In that time, Badani and his management team have spearheaded the in-plant’s name change from Document Services to Multimedia & Print Center and reduced staff from 95 to 75 through attrition, transfers and layoffs. In addition, he and his staff have brought about a number of other changes:

• Copier Management: In September, MPC rolled out a copier program that has brought structure to the previously freestyle copier acquisition process.

• Equipment Upgrades: New Xerox printers were added, with speeds more appropriate to the in-plant’s volume. Also, new computer-to-plate equipment, a new press and a new addressing system have drastically improved productivity.

• Courier Service: The various campus courier services have been consolidated into one.

• Mailing: The in-plant’s popular mailing and addressing services are being used to draw more printing work, much of which has traditionally been done outside. Printing services are being marketed to mail customers, and prices for addressing/mailing jobs are now more reasonable for projects printed internally.

• Online Ordering: An internally created stationery ordering system has proven very successful, and new NowDocs software lets customers download other job files and see an online proof.

• Print Portal: The most ambitious of the in-plant’s projects is the establishment of a print portal, an e‑commerce Web site through which all Penn State printing will flow. Run by MPC, the portal will put all vendors (including MPC) on a level playing field, score their performances and get the best prices and value for Penn State.

The larger purpose behind all these changes is to make the in-plant more valuable to the university and show it has Penn State’s interests in mind.

“We’re not just an in-plant, but we’re integrally part of the university’s fabric,” Badani insists, in a flood of fast speech that betrays his enthusiasm.

A Penn State Tradition

Part of Penn State since the 1930s, the in-plant moved into its custom-built facility in the Hostetter Building in 1975. A mailing wing was added in the 1980s, bringing the plant up to 48,000 square feet. MPC also operates two satellite centers, one in the student union building.

Tucked away in the hills of central Pennsylvania, in the shadow of Mount Nittany, Penn State is about two hours from the nearest city. This, however, hasn’t stopped departments from sending a flood of work to outside printers over the years. Badani describes the situation as a slow leak that eventually caused the dam to burst about four years ago.

At that point, since Document Services was part of the Auxiliary & Business Services division, the university decided to bring it under the watch of the marketing director for that division. The arrangement didn’t go entirely as planned, and Badani was hired in May of 2004.

Seeing an opportunity, he and his team incorporated the marketing arm of the Auxiliary & Business Services division (which included video services, Web design and graphic design) into the in-plant, thus prompting its name change to the Multimedia & Print Center.

“It brought a lot of Auxiliary & Business Services work back in-house,” he says.

Restructuring Into Units

Badani and his team next restructured the in-plant into three business units—printing, copying and mail—each responsible for its own finances. In the past year, each of them has upgraded its equipment.

• Mail added a Kirk-Rudy ink-jet addressing system in response to customers’ needs. It handles coated stock and magazines better than the previous Buskro system, offers tabbing, more fonts and sharper definition, and has a dual feeder.

• Printing added an Agfa Galileo plate­setter along with a new Hamada press. Badani says he is considering adding a four-color press in the fall, though a Xerox iGen3 isn’t out of the question, depending on the results of the print portal.

• CopyCentral upgraded its Xerox 2060 color printer to a DocuColor 6060 and replaced its DocuTech MP135 and 6180 monochrome devices with lower-speed Xerox Nuvera 100s and 120s, all with the Freeflow front end.

“We had a platform of equipment that, in fact, was geared for a higher volume,” Poorman says of the digital equipment that was replaced. “We’ve changed our speed, but…we’ve created a better workflow.”

With the previous digital printing equipment, he says, there was no way to move jobs from machine to machine.

“Now we can basically just send it to a queue, and we’re able to workload balance much more effectively,” he says.

The copy unit’s Xerox equipment is used to produce lots of course packs, booklets, flyers, brochures and more. Variable data printing of recruitment materials, personalized letters and alumni mailings is also big business.

“We’re continuing to get more and more people wanting…to experiment with variable data,” says Poorman. “I think the next step is…full-blown versioning. But it really needs to start at the corporate level. As Penn State decides that there’s a need for that type of versioning, we’ll be really well prepared to do that.”

Also in the near future is mainframe printing of bills, transcripts and checks. Though this is still on the discussion table, MPC hopes to use DocForm software to enable the mainframe data to be printed on the Nuveras.

Copier Management Comes to PSU

Last September, MPC introduced a major change to Penn State’s haphazard copier acquisition process when it rolled out a copier management program. All university departments are now required to use the program to obtain new copiers/multi­functional devices (MFDs).

The university will not only save money by obtaining all of its copiers/MFDs from a single vendor, departments will see a reduction in copier-related costs once they start participating. They will pay only a low per-page charge for printing and copying. This fee includes maintenance and all supplies except paper.

Badani’s staff, along with vendor-partner IKON, is evaluating every current installation and making suggestions. So far 100 devices have been installed under the new program.

“The goal is to find the right value for the university,” Badani says. He offers some savings figures that are hard to ignore: Health Services will save $60,000 over five years with its new copiers; Hospitality Services will save $20,000; Nuclear Engineering will save more than $15,000 on just one device.

“It is working very well,” he appraises.

Projects like this and, of course, the print portal and mainframe printing initiative, are part of MPC’s effort to show it is not just another print vendor. It offers real value to the university.

Badani feels it is services like these—not standard offset or on-demand printing—that in-plants need to offer if they want to survive.

“The in-plant has to be doing things which aren’t available outside,” he asserts. “Once something becomes institutionalized and common, you should go on to the next front.”

Badani and his team intend to keep their eyes always peeled for that next front, whatever it might be. IPG

Bob Neubauer can be contacted at: BobNeubauer@NAPCO.com

In-plant Snapshot

Penn State University
Multimedia & Print Center
University Park, Pa.
Employees: 75
Sales: $12,347,000
Main Plant: 48,000 square feet

Key Equipment:

• Agfa Galileo platesetter
• Heidelberg Duosetter imagesetter
• Agfa Sherpa proofing system
• Two-color 28x40˝ Heidelberg press
• One-color 20x29˝ Heidelberg press
• Two-color 12x18˝ A.B.Dick press
• Two-color 11x17˝ Hamada press
• Three 8.5x14˝ AM 1250 presses
• Xerox Nuvera 120
• Xerox Nuvera NP 120
• Xerox Nuvera 100
• Xerox 460 and 490 copiers
• Xerox WCP 90
• Xerox DocuColor 6060
• Xerox DocuColor 3535
• Xerox CopyCentre C2128
• Xerox 8142 wide-format printer
• Baum 17x22˝ and 26x40˝ folders
• Standard Horizon 19x25˝ folder
• Muller Martini saddle stitcher
• C.P. Bourg booklet maker
• Sulby perfect binder
• Coil, spiral and GBC binders
• Polar 48˝ and Lawson 42˝ cutters
• Laminating/mounting for posters
• Powis Parker soft/case binding system
• Buskro ink-jet addresser
• Kirk-Rudy ink-jet addresser
• Cheshire, Accufast labelers
• Phillipsburg six-station inserters
• Five Pitney Bowes DM1000 mailing systems with Datapac software

The PSU Print Portal

This month, the Penn State Multimedia & Print Center plans to overhaul the way printing is ordered. With the debut of a new print portal, Director Abbas Badani says the university will start getting a much better deal when ordering print. Currently, he says, the university spends between $5 and $7 million on outside printing—and these expenses are not being managed. The portal will provide that management.

Once the portal is fully operational in June, all jobs above $250 will be required to flow through the e-commerce site. MPC will have the right of first refusal for work up to $2,000, but beyond that the in-plant will have to bid, just like the other vendors.

Once job specs are entered into the system, they will be sent to all vendors, who must bid electronically. Jobs will be awarded based on which vendor offers the best value. MPC will handle payment.

Customers will be able to track job status through the portal, and each job’s history will be viewable so future vendors can see prices before bidding on similar jobs. Vendors will be scored on pricing, service, quality and on-time delivery.

“Because it’s an even playing field, all information will be public,” Badani explains.

The portal will direct work toward printers that want to be partners with Penn State. By managing the process, MPC can also make sure that what is delivered is what was specified.

“If you can put a structure around it, where everybody can track and see what they’re spending, and how well it’s spent and how effective it is, then you’ve got a value,” Badani says. “So the goal is to build a value proposition. Hopefully out of that we will pick up some work, but the goal is not to pick up work. The goal is to clearly define that MPC is not just another printer.”