Heidelberg

by Bob Neubauer As an industry, in-plants are strong and getting stronger. I find myself making this statement, on average, once every few months. It usually happens at a trade show after a manufacturer or analyst learns my magazine's name and blurts out, "Aren't in-plants a shrinking market?" Despite the raised eyebrows and veiled surprise that often greets my proclamation, I support it 100 percent—and so does the data. According to our 2000 Market Data Report (published in our May issue), nearly 70 percent of in-plants predict their workloads will increase this year. An impressive 47.5 percent say they plan to spend

Meldisco's in-plant prints for three retail shoe chains—and insources to boot. MIKE KAPLAN loves challenging his in-plant. As if Meldisco Printing Services wasn't busy enough tackling nearly 5,000 jobs a year for three major shoe chains, Kaplan also finds the time to insource more than $100,000 of business each year. "It's been working out great for years," he says. Kaplan started insourcing eight years ago when Meldisco—the Mahwah, N.J., company that owns and operates all of K-Mart's shoe departments—was a division of the Melville Corp. He printed for Melville divisions that did not have in-plants. "I saw the opportunity to generate income and

Rob Lilley spent seven years learning graphic arts in the army. He uses his military experience to manage New Jersey Transit's in-plant. Rob Lilley discovered his love of graphic arts in a very unlikely place—the United States Army. Now, as manager of print graphics at New Jersey Transit, he uses his military skills to run an efficient—and growing—in-plant. Under Lilley's management, the in-plant grew from 5,000 to 25,000 square feet, and went from producing 16 million pieces a year up to 44 million pieces, mostly schedules, forms and stationery. Lilley, 51, was born in San Antonio Texas. His father was an engineer whose

In its first appearance in the In-Print contest, SAFECO took top honors with a colorful marketing piece that required lots of attention to detail. As a perk for its top agents, SAFECO organizes an annual event called the "Conference of Champions," which brings the company's top producers together to attend workshops, mingle with executives and make new friends. Next year that conference will take place in both Vienna, Austria, and Carlsbad, Calif. To motivate its independent agents to work harder and qualify for the free conference, the Seattle-based insurance and financial services firm wanted to send out a quality marketing piece, bursting with color

The world of color scanners is constantly changing. Discover new advances and products that can benefit your in-plant. COLOR SCANNING isn't what it used to be. Say good-bye to the time-consuming task of separating transparencies from prints and switching scanner modes accordingly. Today's scanners recognize what's on the bed and automatically change the mode for you, allowing you to scan film, slides and photos on the same device. "That's been the target machine that the manufacturers were trying to get to," says Don Rogers, product manager for scanners at Heidelberg Prepress. "These scanners allow all the work to be handled in-house without investing in

Leasing can bring the latest technology into your in-plant now. But there are pitfalls. Learn how other managers make their decisions. "Years ago, you could easily justify the purchase of a press and be confident of a 10- to 20-year productive life span. Technology changes so fast today, it's very difficult to commit to a major purchase unless the return on investment is relatively short." That comment from Dean A. Focht, manager of GPU Energy's in-plant in Reading, Pa., probably has you shaking your head in agreement. But what can you do about it? Leasing is one answer. It lets you try out

Thousands of visitors flocked to Drupa 2000, the world's largest graphic arts trade show. IPG was among them. Find out what we learned about the direction the printing industry is heading. Everything worth seeing in the graphic arts world was at Drupa 2000. For two solid weeks, the world's printers crowded Düsseldorf, Germany's fairgrounds to visit some 1,669 exhibitors from 44 countries. In-Plant Graphics was there, finding out about the latest innovations and trends so we could share them with you. With 18 halls to visit, though, the task was a bit overwhelming. The most prevalent trend in the offset world was the move

Finishing equipment filled a few halls at Drupa, with computer integration more prevalent than ever. Computers have integrated themselves into the postpress world more than ever. Take Heidelberg's new Stitchmaster ST 400, shown at Drupa. Data generated at the impositioning stage of the prepress process can be loaded into the ST 400's press setting program. Also, feeding, stitching and cutting are all monitored to prevent jams. Then there's MBO's new touch screen Navigator Control system on its T 700 and T 800 buckle folders. It integrates the folder into the digital workflow, controls sheets from feeder to delivery and includes an integrated spare

Although he dabbled in many fields, Dan Kovalsky found his niche in printing. Now he couldn't be happier. Daniel Kovalsky didn't grow up dreaming of being a printer. But now, as supervisor of Print & Imaging Services for Constellation Energy Group in Baltimore, he wouldn't dream of doing anything else. Kovalsky, 48, was born in Johnstown, Pa. His family moved to Maryland when he was five, and he's lived there ever since. He graduated from Brooklyn Park High School at age 17 and found a job changing truck tires for Kelly-Springfield until he was 18. Once he was old enough, his father, an electrician

Drupa 2000 was the best of the old, the best of the new and the best of what's yet to be for true integrated digital prepress. As far as prepress was concerned, Drupa 2000 affirmed the reliability of the old, elevated the promise of the new and positioned leading market players in new strategic patterns. All that, in just 14 days. Drupa 2000 registered a strong vote for the necessity of true digital prepress integration—as well as the health of proven technologies, from imagesetters to scanners. Drupa also marked the true affirmation of PDF as the globally accepted next standard—with more