I don’t know about you, but I feel dispirited when I drive down the street and see yet another small business closed. Yes, there are tough brave souls starting new enterprises. Their offices decorated with optimistic grand opening banners, but most often the signs nowadays are final liquidation, lost our lease, or nothing at all, just an empty shell where a business once thrived. I’m not trying to bring you down here. This is a sad topic and I don’t know else to put it.

I’m not saying anything new when I report that the printing and mailing industries have been hard hit. Earnings have fallen 40% to 50% over the last two years. When a printing company calls it quits, you might think that the remaining shops would benefit by having less competition and the possibility of divvying up some one’s customer base. You’d think that, but it hasn’t been the case.

Unless you are in the printing business, you may not understand why it is happening, nor care. But you should care. No business stands alone. Businesses are about people and small business employs the most people. Those people when paid sufficiently buy the products and/or services of other businesses. We are interdependent.

A  business is NOT the sum total of its assets. Just go to a liquidation auction and see how much those assets are really worth–pennies on the dollar.

Why is this happening? Here are three reasons printers fail in a tight economy:

1. Printers count heavily on cash flow to pay operating expenses. No one I know has big reserves to tide them over. In fact it is nearly impossible to buildup a reserve when profits average 5% or less.
2. Printers are usually highly leveraged. To stay, or become more competitive a printer must invest in expensive equipment. The multi-color whiz-bang press they bought when times were better carries a multi-million dollar mortgage. Banks don’t care if business is down, they still demand their due.
3. Printing isn’t like the corner grocery. You can’t hire an employee for minimum wage and teach them the job in an hour. Press operators, for example, take years to train. Payrolls are relatively high because experienced people are necessary to fill critical positions. Just try to turn an inexperienced pressman loose on your whiz-bang press and at the very least you’ll be doing a lot of reprints. At the worst, who knows what costly damage could be done? I witnessed a press catch on fire one day. It didn’t do that by itself.

We are in a precarious position in the USA. Until we come to grips with the understanding that we are all in the same boat. One industry doesn’t fail to benefit another. When one suffers we all suffer.

I read in the latest AARP Bulletin that top executives especially in the financial sector are still getting increasingly lavish bonuses while at the same time cutting back on the retirement packages of other employees. I ask, who will take care of those employees when they are retired? Not the bonus babies, and not their companies. The burden will fall on all of the rest of us. A small percentage of the mucky-mucks will cruise along on their big retirements funded by extravagant bonuses leaving the worker bees to live on what the government can raise in taxes. Where does the tax money come from? The taxpayers, with the middle class carrying most of the burden.

Then New York Times in a January 9, post written by Louise Story and Eric Dash, entitled Banks Prepare for Big Bonuses, and Public Wrath, discloses the planned amounts of bonuses and  reveals that the bonuses were “earned” during 2009 when the taxpayers were bailing them out. When will we connect the dots and realize that their actions are not a victimless crime. And I think crime is the right word. They have taken away funds that could have made the country more prosperous for their own personal use. They have committed robbery by contract. If you think those zillion dollar bonuses don’t hurt you–think again. They do. Can’t we, for heavens sake, put a stop to this?

In my last blog entry Credit is Our Lifeblood, Usury is Our Deathbed I criticized the banking and financial industries for passing off PR statements as a  Customer’s Bill of Rights. I suggested some rights that I would like to see instead.  That got me thinking about my own business. What promises am I willing to make to my customers, and what should they be able to expect from me as a printing broker?

Bill Ruesch Print Broker’s Customer’s Bill of Rights

Whereas the customer and Bill Ruesch Print Broker are entering into an agreement to produce a printed product for the customer, the customer can expect the following:

• The Right to be Heard.  The Customer shall be treated at all times with respect and cordiality. All concerns and questions shall be answered promptly to the best of the Print Broker’s ability.
• The Right to Expert Assistance. The Print Broker will advise, consult, and assist the Customer in all aspects of the printing and mailing arrangements, using his experience, wisdom and common sense to place jobs with Vendors best suited to produce the work with proficiency, reasonable cost, and in a timely manner.
• The Right to Free Consultation. The Print Broker will draw on his experience and the knowledge of other professionals to make recommendations  toward improving quality, decreasing costs, and saving time. The Customer is not bound to act on any of  suggestions.
• The Right to be Fully Informed. A bid specification sheet will be prepared by the print broker for every job. The bid sheet forms the blueprint for the job and informs all parties to the scope of the work. It is the Customer’s responsibility to review said specs and make corrections, preferably in writing to keep the job on track and prevent misunderstandings.
• The Right of Mediation. The Print Broker serves as an intermediary between the Customer and the Vendors. While not responsible for the Customer’s debt, the Print Broker will work in behalf of the two parties to assure smooth financial transactions. In the event a problem occurs with quality, timeliness, delivery or any other Customer concern, the Print Broker  shall be available to mediate and mitigate the issue to find an solution acceptable to all parties.
• The Right to have Expert Access. The Print Broker is primarily invested in getting the Customer’s job done right, on time, and at a reasonable cost. At any point in the production or estimating process that the Print Broker sees a need to have the Customer interact directly with the Vendor or other sources of specialized expertise, acting immediately connect said parties.
• The Right of Friendly Support. The Customer has the right to assume that the Print Broker is working in the Customer’s best interest, and will continue to do so as long as the Customer’s demands are moral, ethical, and legal.
• No Surprise Fees. It is understood by the Print Broker and Customer that bid prices are subject to change. Any changes from bid specification sheet that become necessary in the process of the job will require adjustments. The Print Broker guarantees that all fees for his services will be included in bids, and charges for changes. The Print Broker is committed to a no surprise policy.
• No Long-Term Contracts. Unless otherwise agreed, Bill Ruesch serves the Customer on a project-by-project basis. The Customer is not obligated to hire him for future jobs unless it suits the Customer to do so.

The above nine rights are flexible, in that if any of the readers have suggestions or recommendations for changes I would like to hear them. When my Bill of Rights solidifies I will keep it on my website as a continual promise. And that’s a promise.

Where To Start

One problem with writing a blog like this is knowing where to start. There is so much about printing, publishing, and mailing that needs to be said. With my nearly forty years in and about the printing business I’m probably the one who needs to say it, but where should I start? What do people need to know the most?

Created More Paper

Rumors of a paperless office leading to the demise of the printing industry have come and gone twenty years ago. The high-tech age dawned and instead of creating less paper created more. Books, manuals, and brochures were all needed to explain the new reality. You’d think by now that we should be very clear on all of the new processes, but we aren’t. Just as soon as we start to get a handle on it, it changes. I remember when I got my first personal computer. It was just after Windows was released. My bookkeeping wife was used to working with computers at her job, so I assumed that she would help me rev up. I was wrong. She had been working with DOS and knew nothing about Windows. Manuals and on-screen tutorials helped me some, and calls to the technical people (who didn’t cost anything but the long-distance phone call way back then) got me over the hump, at least enough so I could work the darn thing. Whether it was my ignorance for not knowing how to do things right, or it was the fault of the software, it seemed to me that the computer would crash more often than it would run smoothly. Did anyone else have that experience–I wonder?

Computers Run Everything

There weren’t any Idiot books to fall back on then either. The manuals were written to explain things to people who already had a basic understanding. I didn’t know what a drop down menu was. It could have been something that happens to a clumsy waitress.

Now, of course, things have changed. The computer revolution has invaded everything. It’s rare nowadays to go into a printer and see a press that isn’t operated from a computer console that adjusts ink levels, fixes registration, straightens the plates, and performs a myriad of diagnostic functions. A multicolor full-size 40″ press used to take three to four people to operate it. Today two operators are common, and if necessary, it can be run by one.

Typing vs Keyboarding

When I was in high school and being presented with class options my father said to me, “I don’t care what classes you take, but you must take typing (keyboarding for those who have never used a typewriter).” He told me it was a skill I would need for the rest of my life. He was right. Neither of us foresaw the high tech computer world as it is today, but I used those skills throughout and beyond my high school needs. In fact, I’m using them right now as I write this blog.

Computer Savvy Out of the Womb

I’m a little jealous of the students in grade schools, Jr. highs, and high schools now. When I was memorizing multiplication tables then, they are learning CSS and HTML today. I swear, they come out of the womb computer savvy. It’s a new world now, and will be another new world tomorrow. My job, as I see it, is to shed some light on how printing, publishing, and mailing are changing and give you some help rolling with it.