In-plants Abound at On Demand Show - In-plant Impressions

Philadelphia was the digital printing capital of the country this week, as the AIIM/On Demand Show brought thousands of printers and manufacturers to IPG's hometown. Among them were scores of in-plant managers from around the country.

IPG Editor Bob Neubauer ran into managers from Temple University, Penn State, The Hershey Co., Securian Financial Group, University of Delaware, The National Board of Medical Examiners, and many other organizations as he walked the show floor. Bucknell University brought a half dozen in-plant staff members on a bus from Lewisburg, Pa. Others flew in from Texas, Oregon, Wisconsin and elsewhere to enjoy Philadelphia's spring weather (i.e. sometimes warm and sunny, sometimes chilly and rainy).

In-plant managers dominated one full track of educational sessions: 14 managers (current and past) gave presentations throughout the show, which ended its three-day run yesterday. Several of them detailed how they had turned their in-plants around.

Jac Bloomberg, for example, explained how he changed some mindsets at Citi and eventually improved the quality of printing at his Brooklyn in-plant. John Fabian listed productivity tips that worked for his in-plant at BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina, as it transitioned from offset to digital. Mike Chiricuzio talked about taking his student-run shop at Arizona State University from traditional workflows to a digital, Web-to-print workflow.

The On Demand show floor was noticeably smaller, with several of the industry's key vendors absent. The crowds, though, were better than expected, and most vendors polled were pleased with the turnout.

Major product debuts were few and far between, though Océ did draw some sizable crowds with its Best of Show winning CS130T tandem production color printer. Though not new, the monochrome Canon imagePRESS 1135/1125/1110 also won a Best of Show award. Xerox had its iGen4 on display, and Konica Minolta unveiled its bizhub PRO 2500P monochrome printer, featuring single-pass duplexing.

Watch for more details in the next issue of IPG, with a video of the show soon to debut on www.IPGonline.com.