Tim Mulvey: Removing Barriers

The first thing he noticed was the door. A thick, wooden, swinging door, it separated the print shop from its customers in Arapahoe County's government offices, sending the clear message that no one but in-plant staff was allowed to pass.

Tim Mulvey had spend many years at printing businesses in two states. He knew that one thing a troubled in-plant didn't need was one more barrier to business.

"The day I came in, I took that door off—which shook everything up," recounts Mulvey, Print Services manager for Arapahoe County's four-employee in-plant, in Littleton, Colo.

But the in-plant needed some shaking up back in 2003, when its motto seemed to be "no, we can't do that," Mulvey says.

Born in Berkeley, Calif., Mulvey is no stranger to big changes. One of the first came early in life, when his idyllic, car-focused high school years were interrupted by his enterprising parents.

"My parents wanted to go into small business, and back when I was 17, they opened up a print shop in Sacramento, Calif., and asked if I wanted to come and work for them," he relates. With no particular interest in printing, he was trained by a retired press operator and by 18 was running an ABDick 360 in his parents' shop. He soon found he had a knack for it, and began contracting himself out at night to local print shops, repairing and running their presses.

"I can't even name how many presses I've run," he says.

Having already started a family at that young age, Mulvey needed the extra work to make ends meet.

After nine years, his father—a Department of Defense employee—got transferred to Colorado, and sold the print shop. Mulvey stayed on for another year with the new owner, then went to work for other printers in the state capital, including Sacramento Envelope, where he ran ABDick and Halm presses.

In 1990, at the age of 29, he faced one of the biggest changes of his life when he decided to move his family to Denver, where his parents had relocated, to take advantage of the less expensive housing market.

"It was very scary," he admits. "It was the first time I actually moved without a job."

For a year he took short-term printing assignments from a temp agency before landing an opportunity at Information Handling Services, where he ran ABDick and Eagle presses in the in-plant. After about five years here, he heard about an opening in the front office.

"I wanted a change," he explains. "I'd been running a press for so long. I wanted to learn something new."

Mulvey moved into the job and handled estimating and other front-end responsibilities. Excelling at this, he was promoted to senior supervisor overseeing shipping, receiving, the warehouse and order fulfillment.

While in that role, he was asked by management to evaluate an internal copy center, which was plagued by a backlog of work and poor morale. Mulvey was able to turn it around by retraining employees, replacing others who wouldn't adapt and changing processes. As a result he was given responsibility for the entire printing operation. He created standard operating procedures and even got the in-plant ISO certified.

Opening the Door to Success

In November 2003, Mulvey was hired by Arapahoe County to overhaul its outdated, apathetic in-plant.

"The mentality here was 'don't use the print shop,'" he reflects.

After removing the door and inviting people into the formerly off-limits in-plant, he made a sincere effort to say yes to every job offered.

"We'll do anything and everything for anybody," was the new motto. Mulvey approached departments not using the in-plant and asked for a chance. He helped customers with tasks that weren't even print related. He empowered his staff to make decisions, so they would take ownership of their work. He also improved the work environment by cleaning up, repainting, removing unneeded tables and equipment and enhancing the lighting.

Then he set about upgrading the equipment, which he describes as "something out of the '70s" when he arrived. First he added a Presstek DPM platesetter. Then he replaced three older one-color Multi presses with a two-color ABDick 9995 and an ABDick 9850 with an envelope feeder. He upgraded a Xerox DocuTech 6135 to a Nuvera 144, and later added a Xerox Color 800, a Nuvera 144EA and a Xerox D136. In the bindery, a Morgana DocuFold Pro replaced an aging Baum folder.

In 2009, Mulvey integrated the county's computer room copy operation with the in-plant, which printed motor vehicle renewal cards and real property notice evaluations, and added a Xerox 4127 to handle the work.

"That increased our impressions by an average of 450,000 a month," he reports.

The shop also started printing confidential work for departments that needed this service, like the sheriff's office and the county attorney.

"I built a trust with them," he says.

When another county office donated its HP Designjet 5000ps wide-format printer to the in-plant, Mulvey turned it into a successful poster and sign printing business. He plans to expand this business in the future.

When the county decided to assess its copiers and printers to consolidate them, Mulvey was selected to be on the print assessment team. He visits county offices to identify what they are using and make recommendations. If he discovers extraordinarily high usage, he approaches those departments about sending their work to the in-plant.

Mulvey is proud of his success in transforming his in-plant from a "we can't" into a "we can" operation. And judging by the number of articles and positive comments about Printing Services that appear in the county employee newsletter each issue, his efforts are greatly appreciated.

"I always focus on customer service," he remarks, "and that goes a long way here."

Mulvey, who earned his BA in business administration and finance from Regis University in 2004, after years of night school classes, enjoys spending his free time hiking and camping in the mountains of Colorado. He and his wife Cherie have three grown children and two grandchildren. The couple will celebrate their 35th anniversary next month.