We’ve all heard the expression “Time is money.” When people say that, they are most often talking about an employee wasting time while on the clock. But have you considered dedicating an hour to learning something that can help your company make lots more money?

Printers so often pay lip service to training employees or their own continued learning, but when it’s time to fish or cut bait, they find all kinds of excuses not to follow through. Considering the bounty of free webinars available lately, if you’re still making excuses it may be time to take a hard look at your motivation. Money isn’t holding you back—they’re free. Time isn’t holding you back, either. The majority of these webinars are only an hour long, and if you can’t break free or can’t spare an hour of your employee’s time while they’re being broadcast live, most of them are archived so you can access them at your convenience.

In the past week, I have probably added 15-20 webinar notices to the industry calendar on MyPrintResource.com. There are free webinars about mailing issues, financing and tax planning, multi-channel media, sales management and techniques, and digital printing strategies. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. We hosted free webinar on September 21 in which QP’s Sales Clinic columnist Dave Fellman spent an hour sharing ideas about how to prospect for new sales. More than 200 people signed up for it, but that’s a mere fraction of the number of people who could benefit from the information. If you missed it, you can still listen to the archived recording by signing up for the next two webinars in the series (click here).

While some presenters may drop in a brief marketing message, these webinars are probably as close as you’ll ever get to pure altruism in a for profit marketplace. Take advantage of them while you can. Don’t leave money on the table!

For the Cygnus Graphics team, Graph Expo is a lot like Christmas. We start thinking about it long before it gets here because we put together and publish the Show Daily. We start making plans for it and doing the work months before the actual show begins. Then when it is almost upon us, as it is now, we wonder where the time has gone. How can it be that we’ve worked so hard and there’s still so much to do? So we scramble and somehow the last minute details fall into place at last. It’s like putting up decorations and buying presents.

And all of Santa’s elves have been busy making toys. The pre-printed pages of the Show Daily have all been turned over to Quad Graphics. The video interviews have all been scheduled. We know who is covering which press conferences and events. The photographer is lined up and the freelance writers and editors who supplement our in-house crew have their assignments, too.

I have a recurring nightmare in which I don’t have time to pack my suitcase, so I end up having to wear the same jeans and t-shirt during the whole show, much to the displeasure of our publisher. But even if the first part happened, I know where the stores are in Chicago and I could buy a new wardrobe once I got to town if I had to. Oh, that would be like giving a present to myself. Hmm…interesting idea.

Then, sort of like Christmas Eve, Kelley, Bob and I go to the Owners Conference first. This is an especially enjoyable respite because we’ve known all the people who will be there for so long that it’s like visiting with good friends. Sure, there’s work to be done, but we also get to catch up on what everyone has been doing since this time last year, what their plans are, and yes, we even pull out photos of children, grandchildren, and pets.

Then comes the main event. Because the first issue of the Show Daily has to be waiting outside your hotel room door the first morning of the show, we work Saturday to make sure it is delivered Sunday morning. And from then until they close the show floor on Wednesday afternoon, we live in a wild buzz of hyperactivity. I’m glad it only happens once a year, because I’m not sure any of us could handle this pace on a regular basis. But it’s a heck of ride and we wouldn’t miss it for the world. Hope to see you there!

American Printer has been one of Quick Printing’s respected competitors since QP was founded nearly 35 years ago, so I was deeply saddened to learn that it has ceased publication. In a notice on the publication’s website, editor Katherine O’Brien made the announcement and traced the magazine’s history, which goes back to 1928.

In light of the consolidation and shrinking of the industry that has occurred during the recent recession, many of our readers understand the mixed emotions that arise when we see a competitor fall. They are magnified when the field is as narrow as the one occupied by printing trade publications. There is the rush of opportunity left by the newly opened void, but it is leavened by concern for those who are personally affected by the closing and by the recognition of what that loss means to the industry at large.

I recall a limo ride to a restaurant a few years ago. The trade press had been flown out to visit a new facility that one of the vendors had opened. When I think back on the editors who were in that limo—laughing together and swapping stories, as we always do when we meet on the road—I realize that only three of us are still standing. And since Mark Vruno is now editor of Printing News, two of the three work for the Cygnus Graphics Media Group. I begin to understand the concept of survivor’s guilt.

We have watched as first Instant and Small Commercial Printer, then Graphic Arts Monthly folded. Now they are joined by American Printer. Katherine is well respected and an exceptional talent. I have no doubt that she will land on her feet and come out ahead of the game. I wish her and the rest of the American Printer staff many new open doors. Yes, we were competitors, but when it gets right down to brass tacks, we’re all in this crazy business together, and we are a bit lonelier today for the loss.

Note: This blog entry has nothing whatsoever to do with printing. It’s just for fun!

Until the papers reported her 13^th birthday, I wasn’t aware that the President’s eldest daughter was born on Independence Day. Sharing your birthday with a major holiday can go two ways for a kid – I should know – my birthday is December 25. That can be either a very happy coincidence or a miserable one. Luckily, my family cared enough to treat my birthday as an extra special bonus of the Christmas season.

When clerks or TSA agents look at my ID, they often remark on my birthday. Almost inevitably, they say something along the lines of, “You must get cheated out of a lot of birthday presents.”

I always explain that, quite the contrary, I enjoy something most other people never get to experience. When it’s time for my birthday, people start celebrating early (maybe a little too early in recent years). They decorate trees and hang pretty lights, play special music, friends and families gather together for parties and wonderful meals, people smile for no particular reason, little kids get super excited, and on my birthday everyone gets gifts – not just me. And it happens all over the world!

Now, I ask you, have they ever done that for your birthday?

No matter where you stand in the political spectrum, you have to acknowledge that the Obamas appear to be wonderful, caring parents. So I expect that young Malia fully understands the significance of sharing her birthday with our country. But I think she must also get a special thrill out of the fact that on her birthday, the whole country celebrates with picnics, parades, special music, and spectacular fireworks. And they will continue doing that every year, no matter who is in the White House.

Happy birthday, America. Happy birthday, Malia. And I hope that each one of you had a spectacular Fourth of July weekend!

The world may truly be coming to an end, although I won’t go so far as to predict a date. The sign that tipped me off was when Bob and I finally caved in and got smartphones. We put it off for a long time, but even in West Virginia you have to move with the prevailing technology sooner or later.

I was reluctant to make the change because I was quite fond of my stupidphone. It did what I needed it to do and never made me use bad language – at least not until a few months ago when it began randomly turning itself off for no apparent reason. I had even managed to upload some of my music, and would sometimes embarrass Bob by talking too loudly in airports because U2 was wailing in my ears.

The new smartphones allow us to go online, check email, post to Facebook and Twitter, take photos, read QR codes, watch videos, and a hundred other things that, frankly, I’ll probably never really use. (I prefer to disconnect from the great electronic maze as often as possible.) We had been playing with our new toys for about an hour when it suddenly dawned on me that I had no idea how to make a phone call on the darn thing. Since when do you have to read an instruction manual to learn how to make a phone call on a telephone? And I think that’s really what bothers me about it. I’m afraid the smartphone might be smarter than I am.

So I got a real kick out of it when the Hammacher Schlemmer catalog arrived in Saturday’s mail. That nicely printed resource for marginally useful and seriously overpriced merchandise offers a device that made me laugh out loud. Intended to allow you to use your handheld gadget “more comfortably”, it is a streamlined version of an old fashioned telephone handset and cradle that you can plug into your smartphone. When connected, the smartphone goes in the spot where you would find the dial on an old desk phone. I appreciate the irony that at the same time we bought smartphones, someone had brought the technology full circle and found a way to turn them back into pseudo landlines again. Maybe I should order one.

Spring is always a busy time for the Quick Printing staff. First there’s the Annual Franchise Review in the April issue, followed by the Top 100 for the June issue. Spring and number crunching just seem to go together around here.

This year’s Top 100 is finished and looking good. Overall sales were up by 7.27%, sales per shop was up, sales per employee grew, the number of locations held steady, and for the first time in years, the number of employees was also on the rise. In previous years that would be a job well done and we would settle into the rhythm of our regular production schedule as we reach the season for attending franchise conventions.

That’s not the case this year. We have a new project in the works that is really exciting: the first-ever Quick Printing Readers’ Choice Awards. These awards will give you the chance to vote on the best and most useful products that have been introduced in the past year. The awards will be presented at Graph Expo this September. The ballot will be available soon, and you won’t have any problem finding it. It will be available on MyPrintResource.com and we’ll be promoting the competition in print, e-blasts, and in our social media networking efforts.

We’re also gearing up to do the preliminary work for this year’s four issues of the Graph Expo Show Daily. That publication requires a lot of behind the scenes work that has to be done before anyone ever sets foot in Chicago. It’s a lot of effort and very time consuming, but it’s worth every minute. There’s a real rush in successfully putting out a daily.

For this brief week between the closing of the Top 100 and the beginning of the new projects, Bob and I are going to step back and take a much needed vacation. We’ll be back in the office after Memorial Day, rested and ready to take on the world.

So keep your eyes open, because there’s a lot going on. MyPrintResource.com is constantly growing and improving, the Quick Printing Readers’ Choice Awards are heading your way, and Bob and I will be seeing our franchisee friends on the convention circuit in the next couple of months. Then everything will culminate with Graph Expo in September. These are exciting times. Come along for the ride!

For quite a while, I was a somewhat reluctant adopter of social media. LinkedIn seemed a promising tool for business and Quick Printing had a semi-lively discussion group. Twitter was a good way to push breaking news out into the marketplace for those who cared to follow. But for the life of me, I just couldn’t imagine what advantage Facebook would offer to a B2B magazine/website/information source such as ours.

Unless you’re an advertiser, we don’t sell anything. Even if you are an advertiser, we don’t send out coupons or offer surprise weekend specials. We don’t have roving celebrities, so there’s no need to post our whereabouts for people who want to snap our photos or ask for our autographs. I can just see the posting now: “Bob and Karen Hall are at the Lowes in Kanawha City to pick up a truckload of mulch for their garden…get there now and you can meet them in person. Rumor has it that at least one of their dogs is waiting in the vehicle!”

QP just isn’t that kind of publication.

However, since the launch of our new MyPrintResource.com portal, everyone on staff for all three titles has started a Facebook page for business use. I’ve seldom been so surprised by anything. Suddenly, I have way more “friends” on my work Facebook page than I have on my personal one. And the vast majority of them are people I have actually met and know by name. For that matter, I’d wager that over the years I’ve had drinks with most of them!

The Facebook conversations do touch on printing sometimes, but it’s amazing how much I’ve learned about my industry pals (and even some of my co-workers) in such a short time. I get it now. It’s about community. It’s about the kind of conversations we share at trade shows, franchise conventions, and association gatherings…only we don’t have to wait for those events to have them. This is too cool!

So if you haven’t done so yet or if I haven’t reached out to you, look me up on Facebook and let’s connect. I’m sure we have lots of catching up to do.

Thank you to those of you who have already sent feedback about Quick Printing’s new logo. It first appeared on the January issue and is now on our website and e-newsletter. So far, everyone who has commented on the new look has been very positive. A couple of you even noticed the new layout for our feature articles.

Everyone who works on this publication is very proud of it and deeply committed to the industry we serve. So when we had a chance to not only give QP a makeover, but to do so with the guidance and advice of J.C. Suares, we jumped at the opportunity. J.C.’s name may not be familiar to you, but you have certainly seen his work. He has redesigned some of the hottest selling consumer publications on the market. We are exceptionally fortunate that he is now a consultant to our parent company Cygnus Business Media.

Bringing his own considerable design talents (and a world of patience) to the table is QP’s own art director John Sidor, who made the vision reality. There is an updated look and feel to every aspect of the publication, and you will see the final product in the February issue. While January showcases the new logo and feature layout, in our next issue, you’ll discover a new look for the table of contents, editorial, Update, and the columns. The more current look and feel will migrate throughout Quick Printing’s branding on the website, in the digitial edition, and our weekly e-newsletter.

The entire team put a lot of work into this makeover, so we hope that you’ll enjoy it. Just wait until you see what’s next. Hint: By spring, all things print are going to get really exciting on the Web!

Holy dollar signs, Batman! I was talking to John Giles yesterday and nearly fell out of my chair. We got on the subject of printers providing social media services for their customers and he told me what he has learned from some of his recent research. John told me that a lot of companies are paying service providers from $500 to $1,500 a month to manage their marketing messages.

It works like this. The service provider creates the content that drives the company’s blogs and social media (LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook—if they are using it); ensuring that the message delivered is fresh, timely, and above all, consistent. Some of the more advanced service providers also make sure that the client company’s website is regularly updated. That costs more, of course. That may sound like a lot, but John found that the prices quoted generally include about 10 tweets a month, two or three postings on LinkedIn and Facebook, and a brief blog once a week or every other week.

Trust me, as someone who writes for a living, I’m telling you that is not an overburdened workload. John says printers who don’t have the talent on staff to do the work could easily outsource the service and just mark it up—the same way you would do if you were brokering out four-color printing or labels. There’s plenty of demand for these services, and it is growing every day as more and more businesses become aware of the necessity to have a social media/Internet presence.

John said printers just need to talk to get in front of their customers and show them the difference between a well presented, consistent message and the “throw it at the wall and see what sticks” method. Few of your customers have the time, talent, or discipline to do social media correctly. If they are going to hire someone else to do it for them, shouldn’t it be you?

Just when you think you’ve seen it all, something pops up that just makes your jaw drop. I had one of those moments recently as I settled in to check my email.

Press releases tumble into my inbox like the oak leaves that cover my yard. What can I say? I’m on deadline—I don’t have time to rake. The press releases are another matter. Every day they show up, I read them, do a little (very little) tweaking, add the HTML coding, and post them on the appropriate websites.

The subject lines that crowd my inbox spew hyperbole. Apparently, that’s what PR people are paid to write. (IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: I write this, acknowledging that some of these same PR people are friends I’ve known for years. Hey, we’ve all got our jobs to do. Now, back to the blog.) Every product is an industry changer, an incredible innovation, offers blazing speed, it’s the first, the most, the best—press releases speak exclusively in superlatives. Lately they’ve come up with a whole new raft of annoying buzzwords. My current favorite is “best of breed.” Really? Are they serious? They’re breeding printing equipment? This is just absurd.

But I digress…what left me gaping like a cod was the headline that read: “Ricoh Electronics Announces Plans for Solar System at Headquarters Building.”

I can’t publish what I actually said when I read that. The first word was “Holy…”, but it was not uttered in a spiritual context. Then I said, “You’re (the gerund form of that word) me!” (I’m not overly erudite when I’m stunned.) Was Ricoh actually making plans for the entire solar system? Whoa! Now, that’s what I call R&D!

As it turns out, the company HQ is actually installing a solar energy system to conserve electricity. I have to confess, the reality was a bit of a let down, but that moment of disbelief gave me such a charge, such a wonderful break from the usual background noise of “Our printer can generate $1 million within five minutes of installation!!!” that I just had to share it. I could have changed the headline to read: “Ricoh Electronics Announces Plans for Solar Energy System at Headquarters Building.” But I didn’t. As I posted the release on the Quick Printing and Printing News websites, I imagined printers all over the world reading that headline and having one of those wonderful, gob smacked moments that can really shake up the brain cells. Thanks, Ricoh!