WORKFLOW TO PERFECTION

I believe that some of the most used buzz-words in our industry these years are Inkjet, Workflow, and Personalization - and though the latest report from Printing Industries of America also describes the high relative growth for Inkjet not many companies are as experienced as The Bernard Group in Chanhassen, MN.

By Morten Reitoft · Editor & CEO INKISH.TV

INKISH got the chance to visit The Bernard Group while filming a testimonial for Enfocus and Tilia Labs. That was, for me, a game-changer - not only because of the people we met - extremely nice and competent - but also because the way Enfocus, Tilia Labs, and The Bernard Group work together seems to be an unlikely happy marriage. Before going into details about The Bernard Group and what they do, let me tell about Enfocus and Tilia labs.

Enfocus has been known in the industry for many years and if you don't know Enfocus you for sure know PitStop. PitStop has been one of the most used tools in any digital printing production for years. Preflights and automation of workflows have been part of PitStop agenda for years and with the extension of Enfocus offerings with Switch, automation has simply taken a giant leap - both in what can be done, but also in how it's done and how simple most people are able to build really complex workflows. Tilia Labs is less known - at least to me - I only knew by name before meeting with Sagen and Scott in Chanhassen. Many things are really interesting about this company - the products are of course one, but let's start with how they operate.

Officially they are out of Canada but that is a truth with modifications since Scott - head of development - is out of Tokyo. Sagen - also a programmer and the companies CEO - out of Vancouver, some people from Florida and some from the UK. Tilia Labs have taken globalization literally and operate and connect via all the channels a young and modern company do! The people - and I have only met Sagen and Scott - and oh - that is almost 50% of the entire company - they are just great. Two old friends with a background in programming and together they have founded Tilia Labs.

Tilia Labs is a software company developing imposition software - and you may think you know all about imposition software since you know the good old ones in the market - but don't fool yourself.

Before writing more about their imposition tools and what makes them stand out - let's take a look at The Bernard Group.

In a neighborhood with a lot of huge well-known printers, The Bernard Group has three huge buildings. Two just next to each other and the third down the same road - not far away - for a European walking distance, for an American driving distance :-)

The Bernard Group is a digital-only printing company. With more than 600 employees and a 30%+ annual growth and with services that simply is in the upper range of print, they grow in all aspects. Diego Diaz who is responsible for production, and Workflow - AND with a background from both Digital OEMs and Automation and Color Consulting, has built a production, not like many others - and for sure nothing I have ever seen before. The first building house three Fuji JetPresses and about ten Indigos and a lot of finishing and binding equipment.

The other buildings house large format printing equipment and assembly halls and showrooms and, and, and - the tour takes hours - especially if you want to dig into the many details that make The Bernard Group special. To mention just one thing is the nice green light bulbs that you see everywhere. Green is good. Red is not good. The Bernard Group have built a visual - easy to understand - set of lamps that change colors according to the status of the flow - and the bulbs are simply Philips Hue bulbs that are programmable. 

The Bernard Group produce products for brand owners and they do it with a confidence that allows the customers to deliver their "files" in any format - and The Bernard Group will deliver. Sometimes - actually every day, hour, minute, customers deliver work that needs to be imposed and before Tilia Labs got onto the stage The Bernard Group used Enfocus Switch and other software to make a template based imposing. It was time-consuming and the pre-press became a bottleneck in the production of every job needed to be imposed, so The Bernard Group started to look for alternatives. They wanted to have a workflow and imposition that could impose without the hassle of making imposition templates manually - and in Switch, one of the partners was Tilia Labs.

Phoenix is the tool that helps The Bernard Group to achieve the impossible task. Without templates, Phoenix and Switch make it possible to process hundreds and thousands of jobs daily that impose jobs according to the printer it's printed on (on the fly) and to ensure min. waste, maximizing ganging and ensure an even quality throughout all processes and the result is a SUPER effective printing company.

By being fanatic about color management The Bernard Group can place any job at any printer at any time ensuring an even quality and what stroke me being there was the zero tolerance they have. In one of the corners of the shop floor obsolete printers where stowed away and of course you can expect to find old equipment there, but even new investments that don't meet the promise are stowed away. I will not reveal the brand and the machine - but let me be honest with you and say - you would be surprised!

The Bernard Group has the same machines as you may have. They may have the same level of educated staff as you may have. They may even produce products similar to yours - but the relentless passion for automation and growth and at the same time a customer-centric focus unseen anywhere simply amazed me. A few month before we where there their website stated that they don't gang print - hint - gang print has limitations in the customers approach an individual quality. That statement has been removed since The Bernard Group has figured out how to give each job that handcrafted expert individual color management, but still give customers the speed advantages gained by ganging work thanks to both late-stage automated imposition and dynamic color management tied together by Switch.

When we where in Chanhassen this was the first time Sagen and Scott met Diego and his team in person - and it was SO nice to see. They had an open attitude toward challenges, changes, innovations, operations and a nice personally tone that felt like old friends meeting each other.

The relationship between Enfocus, Tilia Labs and The Bernard Group was so openminded and positive that if this is how people integrate and work with Inkjet, Workflow, and Personalization it for sure will be a tremendous asset for the players in our industry. They are SO much on the same page - and I guess that all of them will be winners with that attitude, that professionalism and that hard work they put into trying out virgin territory!

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