South Dakota Upgrades

Leases were running out and equipment was looking old, so the State of South Dakota Central Duplicating made new installations for the new year. The Pierre, S.D., in-plant was awarded a state bidding contract on November 12; by December 31, six Xerox machines were up and running.

"Our leases ran out in November, so we had to do something different," says Manager Gloria Schultz.

This 12-employee in-plant upgraded with three Xerox 6135s, two Xerox WorkCentre Pro 90s and a Xerox 6100 to replace a pair of DocuTech 5800s, one 135 and one 5100.

According to Schultz, the in-plant does all state printing, such as newsletters and pamphlets, but the in-plant can now handle more advanced applications. New features include an in-line square signature bookletmaker, a saddle sticher, an online punch (with three-hole and cold punch options), three Digipath production scanners and two Professional Finishers.

Previously, all work was done off-line, so the in-plant had to have extra people running the machines, and jobs would have to wait to be completed, says Schultz. Because of humidity, paper would curl and cause problems during production, ultimately slowing down jobs. With the new gear, many of those problems will be eliminated.

Schultz plans to host an open house in the next few months so that state employees can see the in-plant's new capabilities first hand.

"I hope that once people see what we can do, our business will increase," says Schultz.

Though the in-plant, with an annual operating budget of $3 million, has no immediate plans to buy more equipment, Schultz says she would like to invest in a computer-to-plate system to replace the shop's old metal platemaker.

"This is our next area where we need upgrades," says Schultz.