Offset Still Essential

What's all this about digital? To a lot of managers, offset is still the biggest wave of the future.

by Mike Llewellyn

IT SEEMS like all anyone can talk about lately is variable data printing. Equipment manufacturers, conference speakers and even in-plant managers have been loudly praising its virtues. But does that mean the sound of cranking offset presses is soon to fade into memory?

Not if you ask Tom Neckvatal, manager of Minnesota Life Insurance Printing Services. His operation is proof that when the going gets tough, the tough run offset.

The print runs streaming out of the 54-employee in-plant's offset press area can top 100,000 impressions, and they account for 90 percent of the facility's printed output. Neckvatal has 20 press operators charged with keeping a handle on all that volume.

When Quality Is Priority One

With seven offset presses, including five- and six-color Heidelbergs, the in-plant prints a large amount of color marketing and direct mail pieces. And with products like these, designed to impress the customers' customers, he says, quality is of paramount importance.

"You've got to have good equipment," he asserts, adding that a coating unit on the in-plant's six-color press may be the most important feature the operation has for producing a head-turning product.

"Everything we run off the six-color is aqueous-coated," he says.

Neckvatal isn't the only one claiming his offset operation is still the bread and butter of the in-plant. Down in Louisville, Ky., home of Jefferson County Public Schools, Sam Thornton says offset output accounts for 75 percent of the revenue generated by the district's 35-employee Materials Production department.

Thornton supervises the in-plant's offset print shop, which boasts eight presses, including a four-color Ryobi, a one-color A.B.Dick and a Heidelberg KORD.

"Our amount of four-color process has gone through the roof. The needs of the district have changed, and everybody wants color," he says, explaining that the increase in color work is just beginning to stabilize.

Thornton says the most popular jobs that Materials Production produces are color brochures and promotional pieces for the different schools in the district's magnet system. Attractive materials are needed to lure the county's best and brightest.

But it's not just in-plants specializing in high-volume color that have an arsenal of offset presses standing at the ready. In the heart of the Big Apple, AOL Time Warner Printing Services has a stock of four offset presses, including a four-color Komori 1420. It just picked up a two-color Toko press a year ago.

"We use that four-color any time a job is going to go over 2,000 pieces," explains Manager Ed Nash.

Working for a company that specializes in magazine and book production means customers are very particular, says Nash, who has been with the in-plant for 30 years. He says his shop has quite a bit of digital equipment, including two Xerox DocuTech 6135s and two Xerox DocuColor 2060s. But when it comes to satisfying his customers in a big way, offset is the way to go. And those customers ask for a lot.

"We had one job recently that was six-over-six, four-color, silver over varnish," he recalls. "The magazine groups are very sophisticated."

Complementary Presses

Still other managers are finding ways to have the offset and digital operations work in tandem. At the University of Texas Medical Branch, Director of Bio-Communications David Barley says the in-plant uses offset, digital and Internet services together to serve its customers.

"We were running all letterheads and envelopes off small A.B.Dicks," he says. "But now we print needed information digitally onto an offset shell."

Barley says the in-plant's online job submission system enables individual customer information to be printed onto a "shell" letterhead that has already been printed by the shop's two Heidelberg perfectors.

Barley's operation is representative of the way many managers now view their offset presses—as machines able to work side-by-side with new digital technology.

Research, Research, Research

Choosing the right offset press requires a bit of research. Before even looking at presses, determine exactly what your requirements are.

"Really, it's got to be your needs first," says Tom Neckvatal. "What types of print do you need to be able to do? What's your growth potential?"

Neckvatal explains that whenever his operation is in the market for an offset press, he and his team put together what he calls a "Needs Analysis." It's an exhaustive study that explores every opportunity and potential risk that lies in wait on the pressroom floor. The more difficult a question is to answer, he says, the more essential it often is to find a solution.

For example, he says, "You have to look at how much you're willing to pay, and, honestly, how long you want the equipment to last."

Neckvatal explains that every press on the market has a life expectancy. His shop has stocked up on Heidelbergs because he says the equipment has a reputation for longevity. But that doesn't mean he's out to break the bank, either.

"Everything in the shop is used," he says, adding that he encourages other managers to hunt around for the wealth of used equipment on the market.

Sam Thornton runs the pressroom at Jefferson Public Schools, and while he agrees with Neckvatal that determining the needs of the in-plant is essential, he zeroes in on one particular point: "You've got to ask, 'Do I have people that are trainable?' "

Thornton says his employees have a great deal of experience between them, but many in-plants don't pay enough attention to the skill required to run an offset press.

Thornton adds that researching a purchase as big as an offset press is so important, it may take years before he makes a decision.

"I've been researching CTP for two years now," he notes.

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