From the Editor To Downsize Or Expand?
I was going about my business at the office the other day when I got a surprise call from a reporter at The Oregonian newspaper. He informed me that the State of Oregon's Publishing & Distribution department (number seven on the IPG Top 50) was planning to get out of offset printing, and he asked me to comment on whether this move made sense.
Since I'm the guy who's usually asking the questions, I suddenly understood the nervousness many of my interview subjects have felt over the years. I tried to pick my words carefully, vowing to be more sympathetic next time I surprised someone with a call.
I read the article the next day, learning more about how the state in-plant, faced with shrinking print volumes (reportedly only enough business to keep presses running four to six hours a day), decided that buying printing from commercial printers was cheaper than maintaining and upgrading offset presses. Digital printing would remain in-house.
Though we can't hide from the fact that offset volumes are decreasing, I still hate to hear about in-plants downsizing. After all, many of the in-plants I talk to are increasing the amount of work they do, especially through insourcing. A number of them have added multi-color offset presses recently to keep up with the volume. They would certainly argue that they can do offset work cheaper than commercial printers.
I shared this article with a few in-plant managers. State printing officials in two states agreed that long-run offset work is cheaper to procure than to print it in-house. Other managers felt the Oregon operation could have done more to bring additional volume onto its presses.
I concede that Oregon's Publishing & Distribution department has researched its situation more than I have and must know what's best. The fact that its offset operation is geared toward black-and-white printing only reduces the pool of work from which it can draw.
I do regret, though, that when news like this reaches the upper management of other in-plants, they see it as a trend rather than a decision based on specific circumstances. Often they don't consult their own in-plant managers to see if their situation is different. Several profitable, well-run in-plants have been closed simply because upper management felt it was easier to follow the lead of others than research their own situations. Though financial reasons are often cited, decisions to close in-plants are too often based on the gut feelings of management (and, perhaps, the desire to decrease the head count).
Where there's outsourcing there's opportunity, though, and some of the work to be bid out by the state of Oregon may end up being insourced by in-plants like the University of Oregon. As for the future of large state printing operations like Oregon's, we plan to look into this in more detail in our September issue.
- Places:
- Oregon