UK In-plants Meet to Discuss Services, Social Media
Dozens of in-plants from educational organizations across England, Scotland, and Wales convened virtually yesterday for a three-hour special interest group meeting, hosted by the Association of Creative & Print Managers in Education (ACPME). The meeting included both presentations and Zoom discussions during which managers shared ideas and asked each other for advice.
The event kicked off with video tours of three in-plants: Birmingham City University, Nottingham Trent University, and Cardiff Met University. Each manager talked about the shop’s capabilities, services, and new services being added.
Presentations covered marketing and social media, with staff from the University of South Wales Print & Design group detailing how they utilize Instagram and Twitter to market their services to students as well as local businesses. Their print-based marketing campaigns are always coordinated with social media marketing efforts.
Attendees also reviewed a popular presentation given by Chris Myers, director of Arizona State University’s in-plant, at the Association of College and University Printers virtual conference in April. Myers showed examples of wide-format projects his in-plant is creating: floor stickers, graduate yard signs, banners for vaccine sites, wall graphics, and more. One unique project was the creation of face masks, produced using a heat press to add the ASU logo. The in-plant also printed stadium fan cutouts, printing onto a pre-cut substrate using a Fuji flatbed printer.
During the live Zoom discussions, attendees talked about new services they are offering. Several have started printing garments. Some mentioned offering scanning services, to provide digital versions of paper files for those now working remotely or to enable paper files to be shredded after scanning. Members discussed how they charge for scanning, and agreed it is a great – and necessary – service to keep employees busy during slow times.
ACPME is hosting another special interest group meeting today focused on photography and video services. On Dec. 7-8, ACPME will host its 2021 ACPME Virtual Conference, to which all U.S. and Canadian higher-ed and K-12 in-plants are invited.
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.
