How printers leap forward in the “and” era of print

For Kodak, there is no doubt that the global printing industry is currently in the “and” era of print.

It‘s about the growth of digital printing, the continued strength of traditional offset printing, and the realization that smart printers are leveraging both technologies to achieve sustained business success.

Among the companies that are bringing the complementary capabilities of digital and offset technology to life is Japs-Olson. Based in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, the Japs-Olson Company has more than 600 employees and is a full-service, custom print and direct mail provider. Pat Murray, the company's Chief Operating Officer, took part in Kodak's customer roundtable debate at drupa 2024. An important question was how digital printing complements offset in the day-to-day production of print shops. Murray pointed out that Japs-Olson has 13 web offset presses, all of them running with KODAK PROSPER Imprinting Systems.

“We started that adventure in 2006 and for us, this harmony between offset and digital has been growing for years.”

Digital and analog definitely complement each other

In 2016, Japs-Olson purchased its first KODAK PROSPER 6000 Press, followed by a second one in 2019. “It really kind of changed the game for us where we can print full-color variable and offer more production options to our customers. Inkjet digital printing is another tool in our toolbox but our digital and analog processes definitely complement each other,” Murray emphasized. Using this advanced printing infrastructure, Japs-Olson manufactures and distributes over one billion personalized mailings annually.

And with the growth of digital over the years, how has the company's offset printing process improved to stay competitive in the “and” era?

For Pat Murray, automation is key because “anytime you can bring automation into the production environment it will help you gain process efficiency. On the offset side we're seeing shorter runs, and we're seeing volumes decline with more versions. So really the enhancement from prepress, the files that go out to the devices to set the ink keys, loading of the plates, all the fundamentals of offset printing have improved greatly.”

In addition to improvements in digital and traditional technologies, Pat Murray also believes that employees' openness to both worlds is crucial to success:

“We kind of piggyback on the labor side. Japs-Olson has a much younger workforce than we've ever had and I think that workforce is adaptive to both worlds – digital and offset. But really when you bring it back to offset, it comes back to automation and that's key for us.”

To watch the exciting roundtable discussion and learn more about how Kodak customers are navigating the “and” era of print, go to https://youtu.be/olx1Y9GQeFc.