Xpedx

It is no longer business as usual for in-plant managers. Is your shop poised to face today’s economic challenges? xpedx wants to help.

The company is planning a free session in Chicago to help in-plants develop long-term strategies that promote their value and prove their cost advantages. Billed as "an intense and serious workshop for managers that may be affected by this recession," the event will take place on June 11, from 8:30 a.m. to noon at the Marriott, Chicago O'Hare.

On Monday, xpedx is set to open an 11,000-square-foot Technology Center in its metro Cincinnati headquarters. It will provide U.S. print professionals with a single location to learn about and test new equipment and technologies from top manufacturers. The exhibition center will spotlight technology covering all aspects of offset and digital printing, including creative, pre-press/workflow, press and post-press/fulfillment. Printers can evaluate new products, technologies and production techniques from major print industry suppliers in a live print production environment.

xpedx is expanding its commitment to U.S. printers with continued investment in its capital equipment strategy. The company has named two national sales managers who will grow Ryobi® press sales and help customers develop new opportunities via prepress equipment and workflow technologies, as well as bindery, finishing and mailing equipment.

THE ECONOMY may be bad, but that doesn’t mean the quality of your printed materials has to be. Instead of switching to cheaper paper, this is the time to give your publications more impact by using premium papers. “They help you set your printed communications apart,” notes Laura Shore, of Mohawk Fine Papers.

Jeff Higgins, a 40-year veteran paper distribution sales and marketing manager and the current director of xpedx Marketing Services and Information, will retire from xpedx on Nov. 30.

Higgins is responsible for marketing communications strategy and execution at the $7.3 billion revenue division of International Paper. He has held the top marketing services post since 1999 and is also responsible for the company’s market research, branding/advertising and public relations activities.

CINCINNATI, OH—August 18, 2008—xpedx today announced it has achieved chain-of-custody certification from the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC), the world’s largest independent, third-party certification system. xpedx is now tri-certified to the PEFC, Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) and Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards. xpedx, North America’s largest distributor of printing papers, offers the largest selection of environmentally preferable papers. The new PEFC certification brings xpedx customers more options to meet the increasing demand for chain-of-custody certified printing papers. Graphics professionals and their customers are increasingly demanding papers manufactured with fibers sourced in an environmentally responsible manner.

MANY INDUSTRY pundits were quick to label Drupa 2008 “The Digital Ink-jet Drupa,” given the technology previews shown by Kodak, HP, Océ, Screen and Fujifilm. Nonetheless, traditional sheetfed and web offset press manufacturers were just as diligent in showcasing their visions of the future. The massive German trade show could just as easily have been called “The Large-format Press Drupa”; or “The Short-run, Fast Makeready Offset Press Drupa”; or even “The Value-added Press Drupa.” These themes were very apparent from Heidelberg, which filled two entire halls, networked with its JDF-based Prinect workflow management system. Among Heidelberg’s several press debuts and upgrades, the centerpiece

Some judges braved long drives through several inches of new snow to help pick the winners of this year’s In-Print contest on March 31. The judging took place in Salt Lake City, in the offices of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Printing Division. LDS staff members Karen Pixton, Judy Alred and Emily Butler had graciously spent weeks sorting and cataloging the 567 entries. Fresh snow covered the ground on the morning of the judging, but the hardy judges (one of whom had a 90-mile drive) all made it. They were: • Ron Anderson, Weber State University • Larry Clements,

Any in-plant manager who has attended one of the popular xpedx in-plant workshops in the past 10 years has met Jerry Sampson. As vice president of development and e-procurement for Prime Digital Printing, in Dayton, Ohio, he and workshop founders Don Kendall and Gary Smith travelled the country, meeting managers and passing along advice on how to keep their in-plants healthy. Sampson has now moved onto a new role. He has joined xpedx as national business development manager for Business Imaging. He will be charged with deepening xpedx’s relationships with in-plant managers and working with them to support their operations. “We can help in-plant

JUSTIFYING NEW equipment on paper is one thing, but real-world verification is far more satisfying. For Jim Sebes that happened not long ago when a customer of the Cuyahoga County Central Services Printing and Reproduction (CSPR) Division asked for a quote on 50,000 single-color, one-sided documents, to be run on the in-plant’s two-color Sakurai press. A local copy shop also made a bid. The customer’s eyes nearly bulged at the result. “They couldn’t believe the price difference,” recalls Sebes, senior printing coordinator for the eight-employee in-plant. It was $1,400 cheaper to print the job on his in-plant’s offset press. This incident only underscored the