MSU Printing Services Does What it Takes

For Crist, director of both Printing Services and Administration and Planning at MSU, the role of his 17-employee in-plant has evolved from printing words on paper to any form of communication that benefits the university—even if it means less profit for his department.

“Measuring success only by a bottom line number misses a lot of the intangibles that in-plants bring to their organizations,” Crist relates. “We offer our expertise. That saves departments—and in turn the university—a lot of money. We also suggest alternatives that will have greater impact but make us less money. For example, we may suggest to a customer needing to promote an event that they send an e-mail instead of a printed postcard. The e-mail can link directly to an electronic registration page on the Web. This suggestion is cheaper than print and often yields better results.”