The Job He Was Waiting For
When the business forms printing plant where he worked closed down in 1994, and a career counsellor asked Melvin Cooper what he wanted his next job to be, he didn't waver at all in his response.
"I want to run the print shop at Berea [College]," he responded. Two years later he had the job. Now, after 17 years as director of Printing Services at the Berea, Ky., college, he has no regrets.
"It's been a great choice for me," says Cooper. "I've thoroughly enjoyed it."
His path to Berea College was a long and winding one, though. Born in Cincinnati, Cooper had his first encounter with printing in a high school graphic arts class in Willamstown, Ky.
"It just intrigued me," he says.
After graduating in 1976, uncertain about his future, he took a job loading trucks for Levi Strauss.
“I thought, there had to be something better than this,” he says.
So he enrolled in Eastern Kentucky University, intending to get an associates degree in graphic arts. But the tough job market when he graduated convinced him to stay and get his bachelors degree in graphic arts and electronics. Then he topped that by sticking around to earn his masters in industrial technology, with a graphic arts specialization.
Cooper's first supervisory job was in a plastic factory in Mt. Vernon, Ky., printing lids for butter bowls. After a year there, he moved to Corbin, Ky., where he was a second shift supervisor for the business forms division of NCR Corp. He eventually became day shift prepress manager, where he oversaw the implementation of an electronic prepress system, before being promoted to order entry manager.
"In 1994, they closed the plant," he says. That's when he made his prophetic declaration to the career counsellor, never expecting to really end up at Berea College. He had known about Berea's in-plant for years, since it was only a dozen or so miles from Eastern Kentucky University. Instead of moving closer to Berea, though, his next job took him far away, out to Lord Fairfax Community College, in northern Virginia. There, he taught graphic arts for a year.
Opportunity Knocks
Then, in the fall of 1995, a chance glance at the classified pages changed his life.
"I just opened the paper one Sunday and there it was," he recalls: the coveted director's position at Berea. Hardly able to believe his luck, Cooper interviewed and got the job. In January 1996 he entered an operation that had recently merged two separate print shops. With five employees and 16 student workers, the in-plant ran one-color presses and a black-and-white copier.
Over time Cooper upgraded to faster equipment, eventually adding a color copier. In 2007, he brought in a two-color ABDick 9995 and a platesetter.
"That opened up some new types of work, and it allowed us to keep in a lot of work that had previously been going out," he says, including four-color work. "Around that time we started insourcing," he adds.
A new Duplo booklet maker let the shop get away from hand assembly and become more efficient.
“We would be here the day before graduation, assembling programs by hand,” he recalls. The booklet maker cut that project from eight hours to two. The in-plant recently replaced the Duplo with a Standard Horizon VAC 100 booklet maker.
Expanding Services
In recent years, Cooper has added a Canon 8000 wide-format printer to get into the poster business, and a Contex wide-format scanner, for scanning blueprints and artwork. He implemented MyOrderDesk Web-to-print software from PagePath Technologies to make it easier for customers to send jobs. And the in-plant was among the first to earn both FSC and SFI chain-of-custody certification.
"The whole culture here at the college is geared toward sustainability," he explains.
Cooper plans to add a perfect binder in the near future to keep even more work in-house. He would also like to get a shredder and bring that business to the in-plant.
"I'm just trying my best to get my tentacles into anything I can," he says, revealing his greatest challenge: staying busy while watching work they have done for years go away. Insourcing is helping, he says, and the in-plant is increasing its marketing efforts.
Despite the pressures, Cooper is happy with his in-plant and his staff.
"I'm proud of the work and the contribution that my people make," he says. "We're well respected on campus."
Outside of work, Cooper keeps busy tending his garden and doing yard work, and occasionally goes square dancing with his wife Tara.
Bob has served as editor of In-plant Impressions since October of 1994. Prior to that he served for three years as managing editor of Printing Impressions, a commercial printing publication. Mr. Neubauer is very active in the U.S. in-plant industry. He attends all the major in-plant conferences and has visited more than 180 in-plant operations around the world. He has given presentations to numerous in-plant groups in the U.S., Canada and Australia, including the Association of College and University Printers and the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association. He also coordinates the annual In-Print contest, co-sponsored by IPMA and In-plant Impressions.
