NEW ENGLAND PRINT BUYERS CONFERENCE
A ROUSING SUCCESS

Eugene G. Schwartz
Editor at Large
ForeWord Magazine
November 9, 2006

The sold-out and beautifully executed First Annual Boston Print Buyers Conference on November 2 at the Westford Regency Inn reminded us that "Print lives!" Elegant as well as practical, Print is the foundational medium for reading, marketing and documentation. It remains an art form as well as a craft. It attracts professionals and artisans devoted to its perfection and who make a living at its practice. It will continue to fuel cyberspace and digital enterprise both as a legacy and as a companion.

Yet, as keynoter Frank Romano, the industry's living encyclopedia of communications history and technology reminded us, print is no longer the primary means of communication in our culture. Further, the number of printers in the U.S. through consolidation and attrition has, since 1995 alone, decreased from 62,000 to 37,000 today.

His forecast is that it will level off at 30,000 from 2012 to the end of the century. And the mix in image transfer will become about 50% digital and 50% ink-jet, the latter gradually replacing conventional offset lithography.

This gem of an event, expertly organized by long-time print buyer and consultant Margie Dana and her partner Ken Hablow, celebrated the upside of an industry cruising optimistically on its own currents of change. The 15 or so largely New England and family-owned printers of the 37 exhibitors were testimony to a vigorous sector investing in its future with upgrades to equipment and process. At the close of this write-up, I have listed a few the houses that might interest you.

With more than 350 professionals packing the three tracks of four 1-hour sessions - covering such bread and butter issues as PDF work flow, color management, paper markets, buyer-vendor relations - it was clear to Dana that next year's event will have to embrace two days in order to allow for more time as well as participation.

Listing out presentation themes doesn't do justice to the sparkle and energy of the event. If hosts and keynoters such as Dana and Romano have set a pattern for the future, attendees will also have an opportunity for participatory give and take with panels, for informative gamesmanship between panels of buyers and sellers (the "Press Checkers" quiz game hosted by Frank Romano) and challenging Q&A with buyers and sellers (Margie Dana), a hosted bar and reception for networking, and a well prepared multi-media keynote presentation.

Selecting informed and able presenters is, of course, also important in both providing value as well as retaining audiences. The panels I attended proved certainly to pass muster. For example, Chris Smith, CEO of American Graphics Institute, demonstrated the multi-media and document support features of PDF's. Jack Miller, specialized expert and consultant on the paper industry (Pira International), explained how the paper market works - notably the fact that the billion dollar investment required to build a new mill has kept the U.S.-Canadian industry from expanding capacity - with imports from Asia, the Philippines, Latin America and Eastern Europe taking up the slack with low costs and competitive pricing. Martin Hensel, CEO of Texterity presented the features of their on-line, interactive, multi-media, searchable and scalable electronic magazine and book editions (See www.ForeWordMagazine.com/online for an illustration of how it works for us).

Here are some resource highlights I picked up:

Fine letterpress printing: Open for commercial business --for handset, monotype or linotype, with that incisive impression you can run your finger over on a smooth or toothy text paper, for announcements, cards and small books or booklets: Elias Roustom's EM Letterpress in New Bedford, MA and John Christensen's Firefly Press at 119 Braintree Street in Boston's Allston Arts District (fireflyletterpress@rcn.com, thinking he may be ready for a website).

Bookbuilders of Boston: For basic and advanced workshops, historic archives, special events, networking and the annual book show. Founded in 1937 for book publishing and manufacturing professionals.

Acme Bookbinding: Fine 175 year-old trade binders in Charlestown, MA, now owned by the Parisi family. In addition to state of the art perfect and smythe sewn paper and case binding, the plant also does library binding, preservation photo-copying and binding and offers a full line of document and bookbinding supplies and presentation products. Two interesting sidelines of many: Digital printing: scanning and one-off printing for preservation as well as theses up to 12 x 18" formats; "Bhutan"- The World's Largest Book - an MIT-Friendly Planet project, bound by Acme. The original 134 page 5x7 foot version is available from Amazon for $15,000 (1 copy in stock) and the 216 page 15x24 version for $100 (1-2 day delivery). The large format was on display at the Print Conference (1/2" binders board).

Very fine commercial printers with digital one-off and other distinctive services. All family-owned. Web sites worth a visit: Ask for samples. Ray Menna's Colonial Printing in Warwick, RI, Charles Poor's Flagship Press in North Andover, MA, Shawmut Printing in Danvers, MA. Deschamps Printing, Salem, MA. Go to "Resources" for some very useful downloads.

Reynolds DeWalt, New Bedford Park, MA -- incredible variable digital printing - needs to be seen to be believed, Graphic Litho in Lawrence, MA, specializing in giant posters, large maps, displays and fine art reproductions. Concord Litho, Concord NH. My sample folder still gives off the delicate chocolate smell of their specialized scented printing - compelling for your next cook book insert or promotion piece.

Several fine national vendors exhibited and lent support to the event - adding to the value of attendee experience in providing quality time to explore technologies and resources with suppliers: Mohawk Fine Papers, Sappi papers - both committed to environmentally sustainable production. Ask for fabulous sample books - paper mill promotion still remains an unmatched art form. Adobe Systems, with ever enhancing PDF capacities, and Hewlett-Packard, in behalf of its Indigo one-off four-color ink-jet presses, recently used to launch the Lightning Source 4-color service.

If you've made it this far in my report, you may be one of the people in this business who not only realizes that the business side of publishing in Print is at its core a manufacturing process, and that the art side is very much linked to crafts that are the soul of the supply chain, but who will find a certain delight in discovering the many ways in which the process and craft are practiced and the dedicated and creative people who make it happen.

The New England Print Buyers Conference is a worthy celebration of the business, its arts and its people. Hopefully it might be an inspiration for other regional events. For information about the Boston Print Buyers visit www.bostonprintbuyers.com.