A Matter of Choice

When John Schreck joined the Santa Ana Unified School District (SAUSD) as manager of Logistics about a year and a half ago, he found a print shop that was well run and well regarded by the school district it serves. Schreck credits Director of Logistics Holger Kasper and the entire team for the establishment of a very successful in-plant operation.

John Schreck and Holger Kasper stand with the Santa Ana Unified School District’s Xerox iGen4.

During his 18-year tenure with the district, Kasper leveraged his management experience in commercial printing environments and worked with his team to overhaul what had been a small analog publications department to create a productive, efficient and cost-effective offset and digital production environment.

“Holger and the staff built this shop, and everything we continue to do is all based on their amazing work,” Schreck declares.

The Southern California in-plant’s digital printing workhorses had been a stalwart pair of Xerox DocuTech 6180s with both in-line and off-line finishing since 2003. As demand grew, the in-plant ran one and then two shifts on the DocuTechs, before expanding into three full shifts. The shop produced a plethora of workbooks, textbooks, custom course packs and other curriculum and promotional materials. Rights acquisition and in-house production were saving the district millions of dollars.

Ignacio Montes runs the automated Rollem Dürselen PB-15 feeding, jogging, drilling and delivery system, which has greatly improved productivity by freeing up employees to do other work.

In the last couple of years, however, workload (then about 4 million impressions per month) finally exceeded capacity.

“We had demand for even more work that we just couldn’t produce,” Schreck acknowledges.

Evolving to Meet Changes

As Schreck came aboard, the in-plant needed not only to increase capacity, but also to evolve to be able to support major changes within the district. SAUSD had decided to adopt California’s Public School Choice Program and became a District of Choice wherein students can choose among schools within the district. The in-plant has broadened its scope significantly to serve SAUSD in its initiative.

By adding new services, like embroidery, the in-plant is providing products to schools for much less money. As a result, schools can re-invest those savings into their students. Here, Corinne Calhoun runs one of the Melco Amiya embroidery machines.

“We needed to expand from a print production shop to be a provider of everything schools would need to tell their stories: banners, embroidery, laser engraving, t-shirt printing, promotional items and more,” reports Schreck, who had previous experience at another District of Choice.

“Everything” still includes plenty of print. To add capacity, the in-plant replaced its DocuTechs with a third-generation, dual-engine Xerox Nuvera, capable of speeds to 318 copies per minute. The long production train features a Xerox stacker, GBC punch and a Watkiss PowerSquare booklet-maker.

“You can’t just put in fast copiers and expect everything to flow smoothly,” Schreck emphasizes. “You have to put in the front end and streamline the back end, too, so jobs can come in and go right out to the truck.” By attending to the entire production chain, the in-plant is now able to generate 10 million copies per month.

Improving the Bindery Bottleneck

“One of the difficulties we faced with the increased production was in the bindery,” he notes. “All of the curriculum we print for students needs to be three-hole drilled, and because of the increased output, we had to have an employee stand at a drill all day long, every day.”

For more efficient, high-speed, labor-saving production, the shop installed an automated Rollem Dürselen PB-15 feeding, jogging, drilling and delivery system for loose-leaf, collated products with tabs, perfect bound books and stitched products at speeds up to 1,500 piles per hour.

“We now have one employee spend about one to two hours a day at this automated drill,” Schreck continues. “This frees up a great deal of time for other work. It has been in operation for about six months, and we have had no service calls, no broken parts and no overtime.”

Helping Schools Help Their Students

Next, the in-plant brought equipment in-house for banner- and poster-making, embroidery and t-shirts, and other promotional products.

The Heidelberg Speedmaster and the Xerox iGen4 stand side by side, ready for anything. Ron Flaherty (left) and Tim Gould keep them running.

“Now schools can have these items at the cost of just the materials, which results in significant savings for them,” Schreck says. “As a result, many schools are re-investing those savings and doing more for their students with that money.

“For example, we have a high school basketball coach who comes to us each year to procure embroidered warm-ups for the varsity squad,” he continues. “The first time we did the job in-house, he saw the [much-less-expensive] bill and said, ‘This can’t be right!’” The coach then took the savings and ordered warm-ups for the JV squad.

“When those students got warm-ups when they never had them before, it was like the earth stood still,” Schreck declares. “For some of those kids, that might be the only new jacket they get that year or for a couple of years. Morale skyrocketed.”

At another high school, the football team traditionally raised funds by soliciting banner sponsorships for $200. A banner that was once outsourced at a cost of $150 is now produced in house for $23. Thanks to the increased profit margins for sponsorships, the team was able to buy video cameras to record, play back and study performances toward improvement.

Branding and marketing has really boosted morale among the students, staff and community in a primarily economically challenged area, Schreck asserts.

“We might not be able to do a car-wash fundraiser because many people here will need to spend the cost of a car wash on dinner,” he says. “This is a way we can really help support our schools and our families financially.”

Success with Digital Color

Just this winter, the in-plant implemented the “third phase” of its evolution, augmenting its digital high-end color capabilities with a Xerox iGen4 and hiring a designer for that work. The iGen 4 supplements the shop’s Ricoh color copier.

“We had a huge School of Choice event in January — a fair that shuts down a couple of streets in Santa Ana — for which we needed to produce an enormous amount of material to promote what our schools have to offer and how they differentiate themselves,” Schreck reports. “If we didn’t have the iGen, we would not have been able to get it all done in-house. But we did, and it was a tremendous success.”

The in-plant has done a couple of test runs to assess the feasibility of yearbook production.

“Right now, students are paying $50 to $60 per yearbook,” Schreck calculates. “One of our high schools in a particularly economically depressed area has about 2,600 students and sells about 200 yearbooks annually. If we can produce those yearbooks for about $21 each, we might be able to sell 1,000 yearbooks at that cost.”

Certainly, equipment and workflow upgrades also cost money. Schreck acknowledges that “education can be woefully underfunded,” but lauds the district’s “very progressive board and senior management.”

“The bottom line is that, not only are we saving schools money, but we are able to give them so much more that we couldn’t have afforded to send out,” he declares.

The in-plant has no first right of refusal. “We don’t want schools to be obligated to use us, but it’s obvious that our prices are significantly lower,” Schreck states. “Through word of mouth, our schools know they can count on us for great prices, quick turnaround and excellent quality.”

The 22-employee operation is expanding continually. “We want to help schools at the ground level first: giving them pens and pencils with the school name, color flyers that they can hand out at PTA meetings, embroidered logo shirts for staff,” lists Schreck.

“Down the pike, we’re considering experimenting with 3D printing, insourcing for other school districts, getting into digital t-shirt printing, and even creating student education opportunities at the in-plant. And we’ve created a proposal for the district to have us store their records digitally.”

Every employee has contributed to the success of this endeavor, according to Schreck.

“For this to work, we had to have a lot of right people in place who were willing to transform,” he says. “Some people who have been here for 20 years saw their jobs change overnight, and they’ve risen to the challenge. We’ve seen pressmen embrace the digital side of the operation.”

Thanks to the team effort, the in-plant keeps moving the ball forward.

“Other districts are shutting down their printing operations,” Schreck observes. “They don’t know what they’re missing.”