PEOPLE: TRAILBLAZERS FOR ONLINE PRINT – AND A GLIMPSE OF THE FUTURE

Online print has turned the traditional printing industry on its head in a big way, especially in the last 20 years. But its history goes back much further. At the Online Print Symposium 2023 in Munich, Robert Keane, founder and CEO of Cimpress, told the audience exactly how far back – and why radios, a book by Stan Davis and an MIT study on the automotive industry all played a role. As the person who founded the world’s first and now most successful online print company, he also had four important lessons to share that will continue to be important for a successful online print business in the future.

“I was lucky enough to be at the right time, in the right place, and with the right people”: the words Robert Keane chose to start his keynote at the Online Print Symposium 2023 sound modest – but what lies behind them is nothing less than the story of how online print came to be, and therefore undoubtedly a success story. It originated back in the 1980s, long before the Internet was accessible to the general public.

In 1984, Robert Keane was still a student and on the team of the student magazine, which – as was usual at the time – was still being created with scissors, glue, and a lot of chemistry for film and plate production, when Apple introduced PostScript, the Macintosh computer, and software programs that made WYSIWYG possible for the first time. The first PostScript-capable printer, the “LaserWriter,” and Aldus’ Pagemaker software ushered in the age of desktop publishing – and also marked the first step toward online printing. Without these fundamental developments, online printing would probably not exist today. Robert Keane appropriately called this first chapter in the history of online printing “foundational enablers”.

He also included integrated manufacturing, mass customization and lean production – all terms that still play an important role today when it comes to successful business models in online printing. Robert Keane told of his work at a small company that produced customized keyboards for electronic defense systems, which were often ten times more expensive than standard mass-produced goods due to their specialization – and nevertheless achieved insane sales. Keane also took part in a training course on mass customization for Motorola, a major customer at the time. This involved the individual configuration of radios and the associated production in a minimum quantity of one.

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