Color Printing Proves Prosperous

Four-color jobs, both offset and digital, make up half of the Exxon in-plant's workload.

AFTER THE Valdez oil spill leaked almost 11 million gallons of North Slope crude oil onto the Alaska coastline in early 1989, Exxon admirably wasted no time diving into the cleanup and recovery effort.

During that process, communicating with government agencies and other outside interests was of crucial importance. Houston's Exxon Print Center was the ready for the task.

Boasting 27 employees and a wealth of sheetfed presses, digital printers and bindery equipment, the in-plant printed manuals and brochures filled with four-color pictures chronicling the three-year process of resurgence for all to witness.

"At around the same time, our print shop was in the process of reorganization," says Don Blome, who's been the supervisor for two years. "We started printing more four-color work, which increased our capabilities."

Working for an oil manufacturer keeps Blome's shop very busy. It's not out of the ordinary for the in-plant to run 2 million impressions on its two DocuTechs and 4 million on its four mainframe printers. But even with that much work, there is still a small number of jobs that have to be printed outside.

"On occasion, we outsource some of the larger sheetfed work that may have to be run on a web press or a job that may have a very large run," says Blome. "We want to keep from tying up our shop so we don't penalize ourselves by not being able to respond to the shorter run work." Digital printing, he adds, has helped with that. The shop has become more efficient due to its ability to electronically store material and drive run volumes down.

"It helps make things quicker for one thing," admits Blome about his digital color equipment. "It provides quality, control and speed, and with the number of changes constantly being made, it produces less waste."

Brochures and training materials dominate the jobs run on the DocuColor 40. The device is networked with the Design Group, a separate department under the same management umbrella as the printing center.

"When we receive the files, we just merge in any photos and do the color separations here," says Blome.

Blow-up Of Color

Blome, along with other managers, realizes the power of color. Less than two years away from the new millennium, the era of images coming to life on paper is rampant. Customers want their products to pop off the page, and color is a viable option. Blome knows that.

"We have more processed color capabilities than other in-plants," he contends. "Because of labor costs and overhead, a lot of in-plants have gotten out of using sheetfed presses."

Three years ago, 30 percent of what the shop printed was color; now, it's close to 50 percent, with more customer demand and cheaper prices because of digital color&019;.

The marketing department utilizes most of the shop's color printing work. Blome says adding color to flyers, training manuals, programs and magazines lets customers know that buying in-house doesn't necessarily mean inferior work.

"We're trying to remain competitive with commercial printers because we want to keep dollars in-house and give our customers better quality at a better value," he says.

Blome admits that his shop hasn't been doing its best in letting its customers know about its capabilities. But that's about to change.

"We haven't done a good job at advertising our services but we are going through a reorganization, evaluating staff, equipment and our capabilities," he says. "In the future, we hope to have more of our services advertised to let people know more of what we're doing."

Currently, the center has an intranet site, shared with the Design Group, that lists its services and contact numbers.

How Do I Convince My Boss?

Every manager knows about the hurdles one must jump to convince management of the benefits of purchasing new equipment.

"Very hard, very hard," repeats Blome about his experiences. His advice: "Just try to keep better numbers and keep track of them," he advises. "That will help build justification for your shop."

He also suggests keeping meticulous track of what you're spending outside—and saving inside.

"Show your managers the reality of savings when they purchase in-house. Let them know that your shop is saving them money," he says.

In the near future, the center plans to upgrade its smaller duplicators and printers. IPG

Exxon Print Center

Houston

Employees: 27, 13 of whom are contractors

Size: 22,000 square feet

Annual budget: $3.5 million

Printing Jobs: Brochures, training manuals, stationery, magazines, newsletters, packaging labels

Main Equipment:

• Four-color Heidelberg MO press

• Two-color Heidelberg GTO press