A Printer For Life
Don Landwehr begin his printing career by peering into a print shop window. After 40 years, he has opened many windows for many print shops.
By Kristen E. Monte
THE GRACIOUS nature of Don Landwehr is one good reason he has been able to grow several print shops over his lifelong career. It is also the secret to Landwehr's success as a manager: He surrounds himself with good people and keeps challenging them.
"It's important to keep 90 percent of the criticism and to only pass on 10 percent of it; to pass on 90 percent of the recognition and keep only 10 percent," quips Landwehr.
Born and raised in the Green Bay, Wis., area, Landwehr—currently in-plant manager for Wisconsin Public Services Corp.—began his career in printing at the age of 15.
Back then, whenever he would walk to a field near his house to check on his rabbit traps, Landwehr would pass a silkscreen shop. He often stopped to peer through the window. One day, the owner came out and asked him to step inside for a better look. The owner went on to teach him the print process and Landwehr ended up working there throughout high school.
After graduation, Landwehr joined the U..S. Navy and completed three tours of duty in Vietnam. After this six-year stint, he returned to Green Bay and went back to the silkscreen shop, where he was made pressman and eventually manager.
The Reinhold Sign Shop, as it was called, had grown into a sign and screen shop. Landwehr also grew, by receiving a degree in Graphics Communications from Northeastern Wisconsin Technical College. After a couple of years as manager, during which he oversaw three additions to the facility, Landwehr left in search of a more challenging position.
He went on to manage the print shop at St. Vincent's Hospital. He also did some consulting on the side.
Consulting Pays Off
Five years later, he was offered a position with Wisconsin Public Services' print shop, in Green Bay. Landwehr had done some consulting there, and when its manager retired, WPS decided he would be the best person to implement the improvements he had suggested.
"I told them I planned on staying five to seven years, that when it starts to get boring I'll be on my way. That was 20 years ago," says Landwehr.
When he began at the print shop in 1985, it had a couple of small presses, it only ran color on Mondays and it produced 400,000 impressions per month with five employees.
"My first day on the job, I cleaned all of the presses to show the employees that I could get my hands dirty," says Landwehr. "Then I looked at the equipment list. [The shop] had limited typesetting and no design. We needed to add a two-color press and some bindery equipment."
With the new equipment the shop was able to reach 500,000 impressions a month. Over the next year that increased to one million impressions.
The in-plant is now producing over three million monthly impressions with 18 employees, eight of them in the print shop. Presses include a four-color Didde Webcom 700, a Hamada H234c, two- and four-color Ryobi presses, three black-and-white Canon copiers and two color Canon copiers, plus sign making and engraving equipment. The annual operating budget is $4 million.
Four years ago the print shop merged with the mailroom and reprographics departments to form a complete one-stop shop. Landwehr feels its smooth transition to one shop is his greatest success as a manager.
In the future, Landwehr says the in-plant needs to better utilize variable data printing technologies and continue to purchase cost-effective equipment. Unfortunately, the shop will have to go it alone; Landwehr plans to retire on October 31.
He says he plans to stay involved with the International Publishing Management Association and with the postal council and will continue consulting part time. In his more-than-40-year career, Landwehr has twice been named IPMA's Region 3 Member of the Year (in 1984 and 1995) and was named Outstanding Contributor in 2004.
Married with two adult children and three grandchildren, Landwehr is a skilled woodsman, having built everything from cabinets and furniture to a log cabin home. He also enjoys hunting and fishing and is a trained pilot.
"One of my best attributes is how I handle people," concludes Landwehr. "You should never look down on people except to help them up. It is important for a manager to take the heat off their people and to help them do better by providing them with better resources, not by beating them over the head with a crowbar."
