Strong Start to In-plant Awareness Month

At Excellus BlueCross BlueShield Document Services' first in-plant awareness event, Sue MacNeal, Tom Tresohlavy and Barb Koladzinski greet visitors and tell them more about the in-plant.

As the second week of In-plant Awareness Month comes to a close, in-plants around the country are actively promoting their value by holding open houses, luncheons and other activities. One of them, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield Document Services, held the first of two awareness events for company employees on Wednesday in the atrium of the company's Rochester, N.Y., headquarters.

Using the theme “Together we can," in-plant employees staffed several tables with print samples, as well as a display of Document Services' In-Print awards—including last year’s Best of Show and Mail Center of the Year awards. They also showed a video of print center equipment in operation, let visitors enter a raffle for prizes and gave away numerous items:

• A Document Services calendar, which includes helpful information about working with the department and common printing and design terms.
• A calendar card, printed with the in-plant's ID card printing equipment.
• And various other items, like coloring books, paper airplanes, branded water bottles, sticky notes and pens.

The awareness events were advertised starting February 1st via a large-format banner, table tent cards in the company cafeteria and blog posts on the company's intranet. Document Services wanted to show employees what the department does for the company and gain awareness.

Interested employees were given tours of Document Services. Feedback was positive, with tour-goers expressing that they had no idea how much was involved in the print production process and that the department offered so many services. The department plans to repeat the event next week.

In-plant Awareness Month is an annual event created by the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association (IPMA). For more ideas on how to celebrate In-plant Awareness Month, visit the IPMA Web site.