Wholesale & Retail In-plants-
Parent company mergers, diverse products and a focus on color printing for the public eye seem to typify in-plants in the wholesale and retail trades.
Dean Sutera hits the nail right on the head when he comments on the importance of in-plants in the wholesale and retail markets.
"Because of the wide variety of printing that is needed by the retail environment," says Sutera, manager of the corporate print shop of Fred Meyer Inc., in Portland, Ore., "in-plants for retail operations are a lot more justifiable."
Retail companies like Fred Meyer need everything from large, four-color signs to small flexo labels. And they're much better off when they have an in-plant that can supply all of these items.
Overall, wholesale and retail in-plants like Sutera's seem to be doing well, judging from a number of IPG interviews. Several recent mergers and acquisitions by their parent companies have boosted their workloads, all but ensuring their long-term survival.
Because their printed work is subject to the eye of the general public much more frequently than the work of in-plants in most other industries, wholesale and retail in-plants must be sticklers for quality and consistency. An off-register sign or product label could effect a customer's perception of the quality of the company's products.
The amount of four-color work being done at wholesale and retail in-plants is also on a growth curve. Some shops are using their color capabilities to lure even more work.
One of the most visible and colorful jobs at Fred Meyer's 25-person in-plant is a 22x28˝ sign done on 18-point board. Printed on a two-color Harris press, the four-color signs are displayed in all Fred Meyer stores, which span the West Coast.
"We're able to do it much, much cheaper than outside sources," boasts Sutera, who has managed the in-plant for 23 years. "It is one of the main cost-saving avenues."
In all, he says, signs, fliers and direct mail pieces—all of which undergo public scrutiny—make up half of the in-plant's workload. The other half of its output is for company use.
Another important color job is the printing of "plan-a-grams," or pictures of what the store shelves should look like. These are sent to each store so that shelves look consistent from store to store. Designers "build" each shelf on screen, Sutera says, then send them to the in-plant where they're output on a color copier.
"Color in that case is important because it more readily identifies an item," he adds.
Sutera hopes to upgrade the color copier soon because of the increasing amount of work it is getting.
"We seem to be doing more color copying for internal use, as well as for short-run signing."
He's also hoping to buy a digital printing system, such as the T/R Systems cluster printing system, to facilitate the printing of black-and-white signs. Currently the shop must print hundreds of copies of each sign, then sort them according to store. A digital system would let the shop print all the signs needed by an individual store at one time. The in-plant would then have a database, which stores could access to print a sign remotely if they need a replacement.
An upcoming merger with Smith's Food & Drugs will soon add 152 stores to Fred Meyer's 110. Sutera is yet unsure of how the merger will effect his shop, but he's hopeful it will bring in more work and allow his operation to grow.
Merger Brings In-plant Growth
If similar mergers at other retail companies are any indication, then this is likely to happen. Take the Sathers Division of Favorite Brands International (FBI), for example. Over the past year and a half, FBI bought Sathers and four other companies. None of the other companies had in-plants. So the Sathers in-plant started taking on work that these other companies used to outsource. The shop is so busy now, according to Print Production Manager Ron Canfield, that it runs 24 hours a day, five days a week.
"There's so much work, even just within the Sathers companies," says Canfield, who's been with the in-plant for 11 years. "They keep us hopping."
Located in Round Lake, Minn., the printing operation employs 20 people, with seven more working in a separate graphics department, overseen by Canfield's wife Linda. The in-plant's main job is the printing of header labels for Sathers' bags of candy. The shop prints 7 to 8 million labels a week on its Heidelberg GTOs. Last year it turned out 360 million. They're printed in three or four colors, eight-up on an 11x20˝ sheet.
Because color consistency is so important, X-Rite colorimeters are used at every press. Operators check every 150 to 200 sheets for hickeys or other imperfections.
Interestingly, Canfield notes, about two-thirds of his employees are female. This, he contends, has proven to be an advantage.
"They're a little more patient checking color and checking for hickeys and the various problems you run into," he observes.
The shop currently has a five-color GTO 52, two four-color GTO 52s and a two-color GTO. Canfield says that about 25 percent of the in-plant's work is four-color. That figure, though, is growing.
"We're doing a lot of process color on those GTOs," he says. "In another year it's probably going to be at least 30 to 35 percent process color."
Other items printed by the in-plant include forms, letterhead, business cards, catalogs, fliers and brochures. Some of these brochures are distributed at the numerous candy shows that the company attends each year, so they have to be top quality products.
Lots Of Four-color Work
Another in-plant that prints marketing brochures is the Tacony Corp. in-plant in Fenton, Mo. Tacony sells sewing machines, vacuum cleaners and ceiling fans through a dealer network, and relies on four-color brochures and point-of-purchase displays to call attention to its products.
Though the in-plant has only two-color presses (an A.B.Dick and a Heidelberg), 50 percent of its output is four-color work, according to Advertising Manager Debi Sharp, who has overseen the in-plant for 17 years. The shop used to print two-color brochures, Sharp says, but in recent years they had to change that practice.
"Every other product on the market had four-color brochures, and we couldn't do that," she recalls. "We were limited to only two-color, and the product didn't always have the budget to go out of house to do the four-color. So I think going four-color really helped sell the product and the company."
It also brought more work to the nine-person in-plant. Customers, having caught wind of the in-plant's four-color expertise, are now printing more displays and brochures in-house. This, coupled with the additional work resulting from a recent company acquisition, has brought some busy times to the in-plant.
"As the company gets bigger, it's really getting harder to stay on top of things," Sharp confesses.
The in-plant at Tru Serv, in Brookings, S.D., also prints a lot of promotional material, including four-color banners up to 24x36˝. About 25 percent of its work is four-color and another 25 percent is multi-color. Tru Serv is a merger between Coast To Coast, Servistar and True Value. The effect of that merger on the in-plant is unclear, but Tom Smith, advertising production manager, hopes it will bring more work to his 12-employee operation.
At Belk Stores Services, in Charlotte, N.C., the focus is on on-demand printing. Manager Ray Ridenhour says jobs with run lengths of 20,000 three years ago have been reduced to 5,000 today.
Ridenhour says that about 10 percent of the in-plant's jobs come in over the network, sent directly to the imagesetter from the company's creative department. Serving 280 stores, his 19-employee in-plant processes and ships 100 to 280 orders of supply forms daily.
