Hundreds Attend IPMA 2023 Conference
More than 140 in-plant managers met in Bonita Springs, Florida, in early June, 2023, for the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association Conference. Joining them were 124 representatives from the 49 vendor sponsors of the event, which was the world's largest gathering of in-plant managers.
Bob Neubauer gives the opening presentation.
The conference got off to a great start when IPI Editor Bob Neubauer took to the stage with a presentation that mixed humor with the latest in-plant market statistics. He cited new data from an IPI survey on equipment investment trends at in-plants.
Then Steve Gilliland entertained the group with stories from his life, while focusing on the important message that “you can’t add value to a person until you value them.” By not showing someone respect, he said, you effectively make them invisible.
Nathan Thole from Iowa State University, and Roger Chamberlain from Cincinnati Insurance Companies talked about their inkjet presses.
A panel discussion on production inkjet featured two cut-sheet inkjet press users: Nathan Thole from Iowa State University, and Roger Chamberlain from Cincinnati Insurance Companies. They talked about how the researched inkjet and what convinced them to move their production print work to inkjet. Evaluating the media you intend to use on an inkjet press is a crucial step, Thole said. Chamberlain stressed the importance of creating a project management team comprising both in-plant staff and vendor representatives.
Another great session featured three managers offering tips for repositioning post COVID, growing their businesses and lessons they learned from the “outside.” John Wong, with the County of Ventura, California, David Chappell, with Sarasota County Schools, and Mike Puckett, of Vanderbilt University, took turns sharing ideas. Puckett talked of conducting “secret tours” of campus buildings to discover what graphic elements they needed, and then presenting his ideas. This has brought in lots of new business.
Roundtable discussions broke attendees into interest groups, such small shops, educational in-plants, mail centers, etc. Production inkjet was among the areas of discussion in several groups.
The conference continued Tuesday evening with an awards banquet in which the winners of the IPMA and In-Print awards were honored. The U.S. Government Publishing Office was revealed as winner of the In-Print Best of Show award for offset, while Oregon State University won Best of Show for the second year in a row in the non-offset categories.
Bob has served as editor of In-plant Impressions since October of 1994. Prior to that he served for three years as managing editor of Printing Impressions, a commercial printing publication. Mr. Neubauer is very active in the U.S. in-plant industry. He attends all the major in-plant conferences and has visited more than 170 in-plant operations around the world. He has given presentations to numerous in-plant groups in the U.S., Canada and Australia, including the Association of College and University Printers and the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association. He also coordinates the annual In-Print contest, co-sponsored by IPMA and In-plant Impressions.
