Cross Media: A New Role for the
 In-plant

BACK IN the day, in-plants ranged from traditional offset operations to copy centers to being part of data center operations. Their main purpose in life was putting ink or toner on paper, charging the job to the appropriate client or cost center, and moving on to the next one. It was great while it lasted.
Today, in-plants have the opportunity to change the scope of their offerings by adding the same kinds of non-print services offered by many commercial operations. These new offerings—often termed cross-media or integrated services—typically involve some type of outgoing marketing offers or other communications to customers or prospects. They use both print and electronic media—e-mail, texting, "landing pages" or microsites on the Web—to deliver related messages that engage the recipient with a goal of selling a product or service or improving customer relations.