In-plant Profiles

Like many insurance companies, 21st Century Insurance Group relies on printed communications to keep in touch with customers. In recent years, however, the Woodland Hills, Calif.-based company’s in-plant had not grown as quickly as its customer base. So the company turned to InfoPrint Solutions Co. (IPS), the new joint venture between IBM and Ricoh. IPS helped the company move from a traditional 1980s mainframe-driven operation to an automated document factory. “The InfoPrint solution enabled us to replace a number of existing systems, improve operational efficiency and increase our printing speeds,” remarks Jim Chalker, director of IT at 21st Century Insurance Group. “Better yet, the solution

On July 1 the Ohio Office of State Printing doubled in size to 89 staff positions after the state’s mainframe printing operation was moved from the IT department to State Printing and Mail Services. The mainframe operation, with an annual production volume of over 88 million impressions, will now report to State Printer Joe Tucker. As of the first of this month, Tucker has also taken over the operations of a large fulfillment operation run by the Department of Job and Family Services. This 28-employee operation has seven large inserting machines and does an average of 44 million pieces of mail annually.

Installing a six-color press in an in-plant is like witnessing a total solar eclipse. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, it is a big deal. Securian Financial Group’s in-plant recently discovered that the rare can happen. Thomas Neckvatal, director of Graphic Services, says his operation recently purchased a six-color, 40˝ Heidelberg CDLX press to accommodate its ever-growing business. “It is unusual in this day for in-plants to have large-format presses,” acknowledges Neckvatal. “Our business has been developed to the point that we have emulated commercial vendors and have attracted commercial grade business; therefore, the need to have the level of commitment needed to

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia has installed a two-color Presstek/A.B.Dick press in its Printing and Duplicating Services department. Kevin Riley, manager of the three-employee in-plant, says the new press is allowing the shop to print two-color letterhead that previously had to be outsourced. The press is also being used to print two-color posters and brochures for the large archdiocese, which includes more than 1.4 million Catholics. In deciding which press to buy, Riley toured the in-plant at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, which was running the same press. At the suggestion of the operators there, he had an Airtech infrared dryer installed on the press. The archdiocese is

Macedonia Gospel Publications Int’l., of Braselton, Ga., the in-plant for Macedonia World Baptist Missions, just added a Canon imageRUNNER 3220 color printer. Richard Vance, prepress production supervisor, says it has “revolutionized the way the missionaries keep in contact with their supporting churches.” Missionaries can include color photos and graphics in their monthly or bimonthly updates to their supporting churches. LifeSprings, a Christian publisher, printer and multi-media developer in Franklin Springs, Ga., recently installed a Canon imageRUNNER 110 with a booklet maker, a Hamada A252P press, a DPX plate system and a Presstek Dimension 800 computer-to-plate system. The Archdiocese of Detroit has added a black-and-white digital Canon

The Washington State Department of Printing recently welcomed Governor Chris Gregoire at its main printing plant in Tumwater. The Governor scheduled her visit specifically to personally thank agency staff for their outstanding support during the preparation of the governor’s budget documents this past December. As that budget was going to press, a violent storm knocked out power to a significant portion of the state, including the Department of Printing’s main plant and copy center. Word reached the Governor of the significant challenges the agency staff overcame to ensure the timely delivery of the more than 1.3 million printed and bound pages that made

Only a couple of days after installing a Konica Minolta bizhub C6500 (with an external Fiery controller), Printing Services at California State University, Chico, put its latest addition to the test. “We had an emergency situation on the campus and the campus police called to find out how long it would take to get 100 copies of a missing persons’ poster done,” recalls Manager Dale Wymore. “I asked them to send the file directly to the Fiery, and we had them printed by the time they walked over to our building in less than five minutes. We had only had the printer for a couple

One clear trend among the religion-based in-plants contacted by IPG is a move away from offset and toward digital printing. Three different in-plants have shut down their presses, while another started a digital in-plant from scratch. “Most of our runs are short run,” explains Lynn Baskerville, director of print operations for the Central Community Church in Wichita, Kan. The shop recently silenced its two-color Ryobi and is using a new Konica Minolta LD-5100 color printer to produce newsletters, letterhead and other products. “We get [the newsletter] out a day and a half quicker now,” remarks Baskerville. “Color’s consistent all the way through the run.” Turnaround time was

BORN AND raised in Newton, Mass., Bruce MacDonald was jokingly referred to as the “token Presbyterian” when he started his job as a printer with the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston (RCAB). In 1984, it was a big deal for a Protestant to be working for the Catholic church. Today, employees’ religious persuasions are quite varied. Back then, MacDonald was preparing to get married and buy a house with the woman he has been happily sharing his life with for the past 23 years, and he needed more job stability. Financial difficulties at Barker Press, a small shop in the city of Watertown, where he

CONSIDERING THE role the Bible played in the invention of the printing press, it’s not surprising that religious institutions still hold the printing process in such high esteem. In fact, some of the largest in-plant operations are maintained by religious organizations. To name just a few: • The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), has a massive Printing Division in Salt Lake City with 400 employees. • More than 340 Jehovah’s Witnesses, all volunteers, work at the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society’s Wallkill, N.Y., Printery, with over 1,000 volunteers in its 18 printing facilities worldwide. • Pacific Press Publishing Association, the