Article prepared by C. Clint Bolte, C. Clint Bolte & Associates, Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. For additional information please call 717-263-5768, fax 717-263-8945, or e-mail to clint@clintbolte.com.

DMIA Print Solutions 2003 Conference & Expo

Emphasis on Customer-Focused, Value-Added Services & Expertise

This 58th annual DMIA Conference & Expo was held at the Las Vegas (Nevada) Convention Center October 22-24, 2003. The Document Management Industries Association is comprised of distributors and specialty manufacturers, who choose to market their graphic services and printing products exclusively through this same distributor network of independent sales and marketing firms throughout the world. More than 1,500 attendees gathered for the two dozen educational seminars and the trade exposition, which had nearly 400 booths. Fifty-eight of which were first time booth participants.

The Expo showcased the latest solutions in commercial printing, promotional products, labels, e-commerce, plastic products, packaging and more. Some of the more interesting innovations were the CD/DVD screen printing, CD/DVD duplication, blank media and packaging capabilities shown by Hartland, Wis.-based Spectrum Digital Services. Elk Grove Village, Ill.-based Plastag Corporation explained the benefits of a registered holograph on foil beneath a protective overlay. Online business card and stationery ordering systems have been around for half a decade but nice improvements continue to evolve as shown by Greenville, N.C-based AccuLink (formerly AccuCopy/QuickTabs) and Palo Alto, CA-based Printra, Inc. (printra.net).

The pre-conference day programs were dedicated to DMIA's special interest groups, called SIGs, to which its members join to improve their expertise at selling and servicing niche applications. These included direct marketing, labels, promotional products, commercial printing, healthcare, and fulfillment. In addition to active online list serve among SIG members for discussing on-going issues throughout the year, each SIG meets formally twice a year.

The Fulfillment SIG was initially formed last spring with this being its second meeting at this DMIA annual conference. Discussions concentrated on one of the most difficult management issues; cost recovery pricing. Presentations were made on often hidden cost drivers such as seasonality, collect shipments, customer service intensity, returns processing, and disposing of overs following kitting projects.

With no industry standards available and only limited benchmarking studies available, several fulfillment SIG members shared their confidential methodologies and results for capturing times and costs. Several distributors attending this SIG meeting have no intention of going into the fulfillment warehousing business, but they simply want to learn more about these services both for selling these services as well as being better prepared to manage their chosen third party fulfillment vendor. Next spring's SIG meeting will concentrate on the preparation of marketing proposals with members submitting examples of their approaches.

Featured speaker Dirk Beveridge, President of the Beveridge Consulting Group, concentrated on the critical success factors leading to an effective mandatory business operating system standards (BOSS). The marketing trends which summarize these factors are a shift from (1) product to customer focus, (2) commodity orientation to value-added services and expertise, and (3) finally, quoting activity to customized systems and solutions. Part of the shifting culture to achieve these success factors is training investment and corporate management setting high performance standards. "Where there is no discipline for nonperformance, we always have declining standards," touted Beveridge.

Many distributors gained early career experience as sales representatives with major print manufacturers before choosing to go out on their own. As a result, a popular DMIA seminar topic is "How to compete with the majors." Two former officers of Wallace and current principals of The Open Approach consultancy, Ron Seavey and Bob Cronin, suggested that times have never been better to compete against the majors. Continued consolidation among the majors is perceived by many print buying clients to represent industry turmoil and is therefore of concern to them. The former perception of security in dealing with the stability of a major vendor is eroding as these large print firms rationalize their over capacity by shutting down plants and reducing, if not eliminating, research and development on new products.

Additionally the majors almost universally have abandoned the small to medium-size markets. This is because their higher overhead costs can only be absorbed into services that they hope are perceived by the larger clients to be at a higher economy of scale. Therefore, the distributors have excelled at penetrating this entry level market niche.

Promotional products are a mainstay offering for many distributors. David Blaise, a consultant with Blaise Drake & Company suggested that even during down markets there are target industries that are perennially strong in the use of promo products, such as, manufacturing, education, healthcare, and clubs and civic organizations. Seasonal and event driven promotions present real sales opportunities. His firm offers a free email newsletter on selling these products at topsecretswebsite.com

Distributors working with a myriad of suppliers in meeting the graphic and document communications needs of their clients have an urgent need for a universal e-com, supply chain administrative linkage. At DRUPA 2000 a number of print software and hardware manufacturers announced the PrintTalk™ initiative to begin developing these XML standards. PrintTalk is the formal standardization effort aimed at bridging the gap in a complete electronic workflow of print procurement. It fits neatly between Ariba's cXML of overall purchasing and JDF (job definition format) of plant computer integrated manufacturing.

DMIA joined this technical inner circle of advocates on behalf of its members with a wish list of 13 administrative communication objectives. The top four on the list were (1) purchase order for exact repeat only and purchase order response, (2) order confirmation, (3) shipping confirmation, and (4) invoice.

The application program interface (API), which delivers these top four, was completed in August 2003 and is now available to purchase for legacy systems. The current focus is on the distributor - manufacturer linkage with the ultimate customer being brought into the loop at a later date. The value of this interface will be in eliminating data entry and error corrections while streamlining operations and particularly the customer service function. Or stated another way this will provide less ordering costs, better customer service, and faster invoicing/payment.

When Heidelberg stepped down as the PrintTalk™ technical contact, DMIA's representative Steve Wakefield, CEO of Sword Microsystems, Inc. stepped up and was appointed the technical chair for the PrintTalk™ standard. This means that Sword Microsystems is now responsible for guiding the development of this vital standard for the global printing and publishing industries. In addition to being an honor for Sword this might suggest that DMIA's other communications objectives might receive a priority nudge up the ladder.

Despite the regular postal price hikes and periodic slowing of the economy, direct mail has always been a preferred marketing media by companies in virtually every SIC category. With the personalization technologies of database management and digital printing coupled with the USPS' acknowledgement of the importance of higher response rates, direct mail will continue to grow. Mark Allen, CEO of Paradigm, offered a tutorial on his firm's geographic information systems(GIS). GIS uses proprietary software to manipulate, analyze, and present demographic, postal, and customer/prospect data unique to a location.

The United States Postal Service has three key responsibilities: (1) define and maintain zip codes, carrier routes, and their boundaries, (2) maintain the national deliverable address database, and (3) deliver the mail. GIS uses this public data along with census updates to help clients profile geographically their existing client base as well as that of prospective clients. This defined market now allows a targeted direct mail campaign to add new clients and/or increase revenues from existing clients.

With 1,100 distributor members, DMIA represents a significant market niche in providing graphic communications solutions. This annual conference and expo offered the full spectrum of the latest technological developments as well as some of the more innovative new graphics product applications available anywhere in the world.

Article prepared by C. Clint Bolte, C. Clint Bolte & Associates, Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. For additional information please call 717-263-5768, fax 717-263-8945, or e-mail to clint@clintbolte.com.