Company Profiles

Taylor Box Company Creates Premium Packaging for Cincoro’s Extra Añejo Tequila

March 15, 2023

By Liz Stevens, writer, PostPress

Cincoro is the tequila label created by five National Basketball Association team owners, and the Spanish word cincoro (cinco oro) translates to “five gold” – a tribute to the company’s owners and their premium tequila, a liquid gold. The five are Michael Jordan, NBA great and principal owner of the Charlotte Hornets; Jeanie Buss, controlling owner of the LA Lakers; Wes Edens, co-owner of the Milwaukee Bucks NBA franchise; and husband-and-wife Wyc Grousbeck and Emilia Fazzalari, owners of the Boston Celtics.

Cincoro produces a crystal-clear Blanco, a medium gold Reposado, an intense amber Añejo and a deep copper Extra Añejo. Extra Añejo is Cincoro’s top-tier offering – a rare tequila that is aged 40 to 44 months in Tennessee whiskey barrels and only produced in very limited quantities.

When Cincoro was ready to launch its Extra Añejo Tequila, the company wanted the packaging to reflect the refinement of the tequila itself and to be as much of a keepsake as the beautiful black and gold bottle that holds this connoisseur-worthy spirit. On Cincoro’s behalf, packaging and printing powerhouse Oliver, Inc. reached out to Taylor Box Company, Warren, Rhode Island, for a collaborative effort to design and deliver packaging that would wow the sports world’s most discerning influencers.

“The goal was to have the complete delivery of both the bottle and box be eye-catching and something that would be kept and displayed by the consumer,” explained Judith Sheehan, CDMP, marketing & communications at Taylor Box Company. “The design of the box and its embellishment play off of the five tequila leaves in the company’s logo, which represents the five founders.”

Taylor Box created a five-sided matte black box with a gold foil lining. The box opens via “double doors” with a magnetic closing that crisply snaps shut. A custom-designed acrylic stand within the box holds the neck of the bottle securely and provides optimal presentation upon opening. The box’s gold foil lining features an embossed step-and-repeat pattern of the five leaves in the company’s logo.

The box is constructed of ESKA board and wrapped in black Corvon Mano from Neenah, which is a very popular soft-touch material. Hazen’s Econo Red Gold foil in #221 Taffeta emboss from Semper Paper was used on the blackboard from Newman, which was foil stamped in General Roll Leaf’s B17-RFX. The acrylic neck stand for the bottle was created by Precision Laser and heat-bent by Schofield.

A five-sided belly band outer sleeve encases the box in the same rich matte black and features the hot foil-stamped Cincoro label along with the five-leaf logo in a raised spot UV step-and-repeat pattern. Oliver, Inc. supplied the outer sleeve.

Taylor Box used an SBL diecutter for the base and folder components and a Thompson diecutter for insert components. The company used a Kensol for foil stamping the exterior tray wrap, a Kluge for the lining (step and repeat), an Emmeci casemaker for tipping of the folder, and a groover for creating the center panels of the outside folder.

“This was not a shape that we had ever done prior to this project,” Sheehan said. “The unique shape of the tray – designed to match the shape of the tequila bottle – could not be made by machine, so it was engineered to be assembled by hand. To make the matching folder work, we did a combination of grooved board and loose panels.”

“From a foil-stamping and embossing perspective, this project ran smoothly, especially considering the complexity of the step and repeat pattern,” said Ron Pontbriant, master foil stamping and diecutting technician.

“Taylor was able to produce the box to the customer’s quality standards and ship on time for the product launch,” said Sheehan. “The quality exceeded expectations, resulting in a premium package and presentation that met the level of expectations from both the A-list creators of the label and its discerning consumers.”

“With foil stamping and embossing being one of the first stages of production,” said Pontbriant, “I receive all the materials for each project in flat sheet form.” When the foil stamping, embossing or diecutting is completed, a project moves on to the construction stage, and Pontbriant typically doesn’t see the assembled pieces. “Seeing this project in its final form – and how elegant a piece this was – provided a sense of pride and accomplishment to be part of it,” Pontbriant said. “It has been an honor to have my work be part of a project that has received so much recognition and so many awards.”

This elegant and beautiful project was the Gold Winner – Best Use of Foil/Embossing – Rigid Box (Best Engineered) in the FSEA 29th Annual Gold Leaf Awards (2022), and Rigid Box of the Year (2022) by the Paperboard Packaging Council.

Adding Value at SunDance Marketing Solutions

December 14, 2015

by Jen Clark, PostPress

The SunDance Fulfillment Department packages marketing kits for a vacation ownership client. Pictured from left are Bryan Blakley, Albert Mawad, Karen Lafler (on ladder), Katrena Bruce and Aura Leyrer.

It’s no secret the market conditions for the printing industry have changed dramatically in the last several years. Companies reacting to the changing dynamics, as well as competition from other media and service providers, have adapted by adding services that benefit their customers. Finding ways to add value to the services companies already offer not only benefits the customer, but also can mean increased revenue for the print finishing provider.

SunDance Marketing Solutions, an Orlando, Florida-based marketing services provider, commercial printer and producer of fine art lithographs, offers fulfillment and kitting services that increase innovation and efficiency to streamline its clients’ marketing efforts. Founded in 2007, SunDance has maintained a 24-percent compound annual growth rate and recently moved into a 43,500-square-foot facility – more than triple the size of its first factory.

“We’ve found that the more value-added services we offer, the longer clients stay with us,” said Brad Taylor, sales manager and partner at SunDance. “When we deliver on the value-added services, it builds trust with our client base and leads to more business from them with existing product lines, as well as new product lines. Clients seem to prefer dealing with fewer vendors, so the more we can offer them, the more business we bring in and retain. One of the biggest reasons we offer value-added services is we’ve also found the more we do in-house, the greater control we have on quality, turnaround and overall job efficiency throughout the plant.”

SunDance prides itself on always saying “Yes” to its clients, so value-added services aren’t exactly new to the multi-channel print- and marketing-solutions company. “We’ve always provided value-added services, just not to the scale we currently do,” Taylor said. “If they ask us if we can do something, as long as it’s within our wheelhouse, or even just reasonably close, we figure out how to get it done. Over the years, this has led us to develop a wide range of services that we can deliver to clients in a win-win manner. Our client gets the service they need at the price they want and we gain the immediate revenue, as well as greater control of the end product in terms of quality and turnaround – not to mention the further diversification of our offerings.”

He said value-added services really took off when SunDance purchased all of the equipment of a finishing company that was closing its doors. “Our customers asking for more has led to us perfecting many different services, including foil stamping, embossing, custom diecutting, laminating, punching, perfect binding, stitching, map folding and coil binding,” Taylor said.

In addition, the company offers fulfillment services that are “pretty popular,” he noted. SunDance provides mailing services, kitting, packaging and shipping, staging, inventory control and even web-to-print or print-on-demand storefronts for some of its larger clients. “Many have locations around the world and rely on us to ensure that their materials and brand are consistent with their standards worldwide. It really depends on what the client needs for each individual product line, project or item,” Taylor explained.

SunDance’s clients have realized the value in having the entire process – printing, finishing, kitting, fulfillment and shipping – handled with one vendor at one site, Taylor continued. This reduces cost, speeds up turnaround and reduces the potential for mistakes and delays. SunDance constantly is expanding its warehouse space to accommodate the growing desire for this convenience. “Many clients need us to store their marketing materials either short-term or long-term,” he said. “Sometimes we offer warehousing as an add-on when a client needs to free up extra space in their location(s), but most frequently warehousing is part of the fulfillment process. We have the items that we’re fulfilling here in our warehouse and we pick-and-pack as needed for our clients.”

Generally, inventory management makes the most sense for large clients, Taylor added. “Smaller clients typically manage inventory themselves as it’s manageable by anyone.” A typical inventory management project can involve SunDance either printing or producing the inventory. “Or the client sends us existing inventory,” he said. Once the inventory is documented and put into the inventory management system, the client can “access their inventory through a custom-built web-based storefront and order whatever they need to be picked and sent anywhere in the world,” Taylor explained.

Utilizing value-added services can give printers and postpress providers an advantage over the competition. For SunDance, it has been a boon to the bottom line, Taylor said. “There have been several months over the past few years that were made profitable by value-added services,” he said. “Typically, there is very little hard cost in these services. They generally are achieved by labor and often it’s slack labor being used vs. having to hire additional employees to handle the increased workload. In some cases, this makes the value-added service skip the P&L and go to straight to the bottom line!”

For those companies looking to get into or expand their value-added options, Taylor suggests having software that can track inventory, shipping and billing, along with competently trained personnel. “It’s also important to purchase equipment at a good price, maintain it well and cross train employees so slack labor can be utilized to allow for a streamlined manufacturing process,” he said. “Adding fulfillment and other value-added services can be a huge advantage.”

Pacific Bindery Services Showcases Its Own Skills

August 27, 2014

by Dianna Brodine, The Binding Edge

The Big Book, a promotional piece for Pacific Bindery Services, received a 2014 Product of Excellence Award from the Binding Industries Association (BIA) in the self-promotion category, and the bindery was declared BIA’s Graphic Finisher of the Year.

It’s the greatest maxim of marketing: don’t tell the customers what you can do… show them what you can do. Pacific Bindery Services, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, took the old saying to heart and created an award-winning piece that has impressed not only its peers, but also the companys customers.

Pacific Bindery is a finishing and bindery services company that has built a strong reputation as a postpress services organization known for excellent quality, efficient services and quick delivery. Now one of the largest binderies in the Pacific Northwest, Pacific Bindery employs 50 staff members, many of whom are long-term employees and all of whom are well-trained and experienced in the bindery trade. Pacific Bindery’s vision has been clearly focused on providing customers with excellent products, technology and services.

With a full range of bindery and finishing services, including perfect binding, lay-flat binding, mechanical binding, stitching, collating, folding, gluing, diemaking, diecutting, embossing and foil stamping, the bindery wanted to find an effective way to communicate those capabilities to its customers and prospects. “The Big Book,” as it is known internally, was the answer. Formally labeled as “Finishing & Binding Guide: a Diverse Range of Services for Exceptional Results,” the book provides a detailed look at the specialty finishing options provided by Pacific Bindery Services.

Self-promotion at its finest

Pacific Bindery had previously produced a number of self-promotion pieces, according to General Manager Kris Bovay. “What was different about this one,” she explained, “was that, with the acquisition of a specialty finishing company in April 2012, we added some new services. This piece was developed and designed to highlight the integration of those services into our overall services list and to demonstrate that integration in a very visual way.”

The concept originated with Bovay, but it was all hands on deck to develop the full promotional piece. Bovay involved employees who directly produced the services highlighted on each page, including the laser cutting operator, diecutting operator, foil stamping and embossing operator and the operators from all other departments. “Their input was really the foundation of the production tips found throughout the book,” said Bovay. “We all wanted to inform clients of the best uses, design parameters and constraints for each specialty technique.”

In addition to the operators, key input was obtained from the Pacific Bindery Services production coordinators. “Their experience with projects and clients was integral in the development of this piece,” Bovay explained.

Constructing the capabilities piece

Each two-page spread features a description and illustration of a finishing process, along with production and design tips. Processes include laser cutting, laser etching and rasterizing, diemaking and diecutting, foil stamping and embossing, embossing and debossing, perfect binding, stitching, mechanical binding and folding/gluing. Also discussed are laminating, d-taping, cutting and value-added products such as easels and business card boxes.

Services that were not well understood or known – such as the intricate detail provided by laser cutting (including etching and rasterizing) – were highlighted. Many of the pages included a fold out so the technique could be fully appreciated, and a one-word description drove home the marketing advantage. For instance, the laser cutting page folds out to reveal the word “precision”, while the foil stamping and embossing page proclaims “depth”.

“Pacific Bindery’s services are well-known in our markets,” Bovay said, “so the focus of this piece was to highlight the integration of the new finishing services with the existing services. The front of the book is “heavy” with these new services, while the back of the book features our well-known binding capabilities.”

The Big Book’s text was written by Bovay after she developed questions and circulated them for input from key staff. Final content was circulated amongst a core group of eight for edits and feedback. Once ready for design, Bovay contacted Mia Lupton of Millennia Graphics. Lupton has been the graphic designer for Pacific Bindery on a number of projects.

Production details

The production notes in the back of the book provided information to customers and prospects wishing to recreate a specific look. The project utilized 130lb and 100lb Cougar Opaque Cover throughout, which contains 10-percent post-consumer waste and is FSC® certified. Other production details include ink colors and foil colors used. All varnishes and inks were wax-free, and soft touch laminating was provided by R & M Trade Laminating Ltd. The book was Wire-O bound in gloss black. Diecutting, embossing, debossing and foil stamping were used on pages throughout the book, as was laser cutting and fold outs.

Pacific Bindery Services took the opportunity to offer design advice as well. For example, in the embossing and debossing pages of the book, information is provided on minimum paper thickness, substrate type and embossing depth. To provide additional information, separate booklets on the Pacific Bindery Die Shop and a Designers’ Guide can be pulled from diecut sleeves. The Designers’ Guide provides general binding and finishing guidelines and a frequently asked questions section.

Targeting the audience

The primary audience for the promotional piece was the print community in British Columbia and Alberta. Distribution was accomplished through face-to-face presentations, allowing Bovay to present the features and benefits of each service in person to client groups. The secondary target audience is graphic designers, according to Bovay. “Many of these designers have limited awareness of specialty services,” she said. “Pacific Bindery is focused on raising awareness and understanding of the importance of finishing services to the overall success of clients’ projects.”

With 5,000 books printed, response has been phenomenal, both from prospective customers and from the finishing industry. “Pacific Bindery certainly has seen an increase in requests for laser cutting, which – prior to The Big Book – had a very low profile with corresponding low sales,” Bovay explained. “We’re also focusing on increasing sales in diecutting, foiling and embossing/debossing.” These are services that integrate well with the binding departments at Pacific Bindery, since a client’s project may have a cover that is foil stamped, embossed and diecut before moving on to the perfect binder to be bound with the text pages. “Brand recognition and awareness of the services we offer have increased significantly since the book was produced and distributed,” she said.

In addition to customer accolades and a bump to the bottom line, Pacific Bindery Services was recognized by its peers. The book received a Product of Excellence Award from the Binding Industries Association (BIA) in the self-promotion category, and the bindery was declared BIA’s Graphic Finisher of the Year. The recognition is simply one more thing for Pacific Bindery Services to show its customers as an illustration of its exceptional work.

A New Beginning at Phillips Graphic Finishing

May 29, 2014

by Jen Clark, The Binding Edge

Plant Manager Bill Kelly, left, and George Zook go over details of a foil stamping job.

After 17 years as a management consultant for several leading global professional services firms, Andrew Hoffman was ready for something new. He researched his options, put together a group of investors and bought a bindery, even though he had no experience with the printing, binding or finishing industries. However, Hoffman brought a keen awareness of what it takes for any business to be successful – a systematic approach with a focus on the big picture.

“When I was looking to buy a company, I looked at all sorts of industries,” said Hoffman, who has been president and CEO of Phillips Graphic Finishing, LLC for about a year. “I looked at anything that came across my desk. I really knew nothing about the printing industry or the binding industry, and when this came to my attention I said, ‘Who would buy a bookbinding company in this day and age?’ But when I looked at the information and started to investigate the industry and the binding side of it, I realized it was a good business decision.”

Phillips Graphic Finishing is a full-service postpress finishing and trade bindery located in Manheim, PA. It provides services in three main groupings: binding, finishing and diecutting. “As with many trade binderies, the assortment of services offered by Phillips is commonly bundled together by customers and provides a competitive advantage to Phillips for complex jobs that utilize more than one process,” Hoffman said. “Many customers choose Phillips for its broad array of services, in addition to its excellent reputation with printers throughout the region to consistently produce high-quality work within tight deadlines. We are known as the go-to bindery for complex jobs.”

He said unlike some competitors, Phillips has the right mix of experience and machinery to accomplish complex tasks. “I think people know that if it’s a difficult job, we’ll get it done and get it done right,” he said. “If someone wants to saddlestitch, foil stamp and perfect bind, then fold and glue, we can do all of those things, whereas some other binderies have to farm it out to finish various aspects.”

But the competition is stiff, he noted. Phillips serves the Philadelphia, PA, Lancaster, PA and Baltimore, MD, areas. Full-service binderies in Baltimore and Philadelphia, in addition to smaller binderies with limited finishing capabilities, vie for business from the same pool of clients as Phillips. “Other competition comes from the printers with in-house bindery capabilities,” Hoffman said. “Sometimes we’ll take jobs from an in-house bindery that is either overwhelmed or has an equipment failure. Our competitors sometimes are our customers, too, which is an odd reality in some industries, but is the norm for us.”

Humble beginnings

In 1957, Si Phillips opened S. G. Phillips, Printer, a diecutting and printing business, in Mount Joy, PA. The business was incorporated as Phillips Die Cutting, Inc. in 1979. A year later, Phillips retired and sold the business to Eric Liddell, who had joined the company in 1974. Liddell moved the company to its current location in Manheim, PA, in 1986. Upon his retirement in 1993, Liddell sold the company to Doug Shelly, who had been with the company since 1984. Shelly changed its name to Phillips Graphic Finishing to better reflect the variety of services it offered.

Andy Hoffman, president and CEO of Phillips Graphic Finishing, LLC, said the highly skilled employees trained in handwork will play a key role in the company’s future growth.

As the company grew, it added more machinery and more capabilities. One thing that stood out, according to Hoffman’s research, is that as the company grew, management would talk to the customers to find out what services would benefit them. “They’d go out and buy those pieces of machinery or upgrade machinery based on what the clients were asking for,” he said. In 2008, a major expansion was undertaken to accommodate the growing business. It included a 3,000 sq. ft. office addition and a 23,500 sq. ft. production addition, for a total production space of 55,300 sq. ft.

In 2013, Shelly sold the company to a group of investors led by Hoffman. “I organized the group (of investors), and my family has the majority interest,” Hoffman noted. “Here, a lot of people just call me the owner, but I’m not the only owner.” He is, however, the only one with an active role in running the company. Three other members of the investment group make up a board of advisers, though.

In the last year, Phillips Graphic Finishing has seen an uptick in business, but Hoffman doesn’t think that had anything to do with him. “We’ve been very, very busy,” he said. “Toward the end of last year, some of the employees were coming up to me asking, ‘Andy, did you bring all of this new business with you?’ I had no contacts within the printing industry, so it was just luck.”

He’s learned, though, that there is an ebb and flow to the amount of work that comes in. “I think we are even less busy now than we were at this time last year. January and February were good. March was lighter than last year. We still are projected to have a good year and to grow, but we haven’t made any specific changes to aid in that growth – other than new machinery. We haven’t done any sales promotions or anything like that,” he explained.

An attractive investment

Andy Hoffman is president and CEO of Phillips Graphic Finishing, LLC.

In his research, Hoffman found Phillips Graphic Finishing was well established and had a solid base of clients. “It had a small amount of customers, but the end-users of the clients were Fortune 500 companies. The feeling is that printing might be dying, but the people who are our customers – not the actual printers, but the end-users – are never going to stop printing,” he said. “That was one of the reasons (it appealed to me). The other is it is a service business. I like that concept.”

Hoffman had spent the majority of his professional career advising numerous Fortune 100 companies, as well as medium- and small-sized privately held organizations across a variety of industries. “My entire career was spent going into a business and trying to figure it out in two weeks and then improving their processes,” he said. “For me, this was just another case or another project. I utilized the same skills from my consulting career to evaluate the key points of the business. I think it helped that I had worked with so many different businesses, and I could relate to this one.”

Hoffman hasn’t made any major changes to the way Phillips Graphic Finishing does business, but he has made a few smaller adjustments, including equipment purchases and policy changes. “It’s really just been a few little tweaks here and there,” he said. “That was my intention for the first year. I knew it was going to be a learning curve to figure out what the most effective changes could be. I’m still not even a year in. But, on the other hand, it was a very well-run business for many, many years.” He said the biggest change was hiring a director of finance, “but that was part of my plan.”

The staff’s reaction to the ownership change was marked with cautious optimism, Hoffman said. “I think they were surprised because we kept everything pretty silent until we brought everyone into the conference room. Doug said, ‘I sold the business; here’s the new owner’,” he recalled. “People don’t really like change in general. I think they were trying to feel me out. The first couple of weeks, I don’t think people opened up to me or tried to get to know me. They just wanted to see what I was going to do. Were their jobs safe? Was I going to do stupid things and make everyone’s life miserable? Or, would I have new ideas and want to change the company for growth? Hopefully they’re pleasantly surprised that my plan is to grow the company and make their lives easier.”

As he took over, the learning curve was steep. But three key people, in addition to Shelly, helped ease the transition. “At first it was really, really intense,” he recalled. “Even though I had studied and talked to a lot of people, it’s not until you’re in a bindery that you really figure out what printing is all about. I had no background in printing, so lucky for me the people who are here are very, very good teachers. The plant manager, customer service manager and sales person – anytime they brought something up to me, they would educate me on the question they were asking or explain why they did something a certain way. Then, after a while, I started to pick it up. Probably in the first three months, I knew enough to be dangerous. After six months, I knew enough to make decisions and be confident that I was knowledgeable enough to make the right decision.”

One detail of the sale, Hoffman explained, was that Shelly would stay on for six months to answer questions and ease Hoffman into the business. The plan was for Shelly to be involved less and less as time went on, but it didn’t quite work out that way. “At one point, he came to me and said, ‘Andy, I feel like I’m wasting your money. You know enough, and I want to get on with my life.’ And, we were good with that. He was supposed to be here for six months, but he only stayed for four.”

The response to new ownership from customers has been positive. “It’s gone like I had hoped,” Hoffman said. “I didn’t really want to raise any red flags with anyone. I think everyone was happy with the quality (of our work), and we are trying to keep that same quality and same high opinion that people have of Phillips Graphic Finishing. I don’t think there’s been too much change in that area.”

A ‘very good’ workforce

Phillips Graphic Finishing offers a comprehensive range of binding, finishing and diecutting solutions including saddlestitching, perfect binding, wire-o and spiral binding; handwork, mounting, film laminating, inline gluing and insertion; folding; diemaking and diecutting; and foil stamping and embossing. The company has state-of-the art bindery equipment including a Kolbus perfect binder; two Heidelberg saddlestitching lines; two Bobst folder-gluer lines; two Bobst Speria 106E diecutters; a stable of MBO folders; and four Polar cutters. On the finishing side, it utilizes three Heidelberg Cylinder Letterpresses; two Heidelberg Windmills for foil and diecutting; a Cioni foil stamper/emboss/deboss/diecutter; a Franklin foil/emboss/deboss stamper; a Kluge foil/diecutter; and other clamshell handfed diecutters and embossers, as well as two BR Moll Regals, fully automated diemaking equipment, wafer sealers, eyeletters, a Crathern mounting machine, round cornering and drilling, two Punchmasters, a collator, two Rilecart Wire-O machines, a Coilmaster Junior for spiral binding and three remoisten glue machines.

“We serve the commercial printing industry,” Hoffman said. “The end customers vary to a large degree, but we do a lot in the form of marketing materials for pharmaceutical companies, financial services and banking companies, manufacturing companies, consumer goods and colleges and universities.”

The company’s production facility is open 24 hours a day, including weekends as needed. It operates a three-shift schedule with approximately 80 employees, with a goal to provide the highest quality and fastest turnaround times available in the industry. “Our employees are cross-trained to give us the flexibility to run several different types of machinery on all three of our shifts,” Hoffman said, noting every shift is assigned a weekend at the beginning of the year. “If we have work that needs to be done on a particular weekend, we have a shift to cover it,” he said. “We plan ahead for it.”

One of the things that surprised Hoffman from the beginning is “how good my workforce is from a technical standpoint. They are very technical craftsmen – everything you want to have in a workforce,” he said. “We have so many great ones here who have been in the industry and in the business for a long time. The flip side is that there really are not that many printing programs or trade schools in the area anymore. It’s hard to find newer employees that have had as good of training as in the past, so we have to do it in-house.”

Phillips Graphic Finishing utilizes an informal training program for new employees, who are trained on the machinery they will be working on first. “We usually hire new employees for specific needs and have our existing expert operators train the new employees,” Hoffman said. “We also will bring people from one shift to another so that the new employees can learn from more than one individual and gain experience running alongside different operators.”

Because there is a wide variety of jobs that come through the plant, Hoffman said it is difficult to train people to become experts on every type of job they will run. “We also send employees to vendor-based training on an as-needed basis,” he said. “There used to be full apprentice programs at printers and binderies that just don’t exist anymore. I think there are people interested in the industry, but when you say ‘graphic arts,’ now they think digital and using computers, not using machinery or setting up work on saddlestitchers, diecutters or something like that.”

Even though Hoffman hasn’t been in the industry long, he has learned that every week and every month is going to be different in terms of types of jobs and size of runs. He’s also learned schedules aren’t always set in stone. “We are very up-front with our customers about what we can do when it comes to scheduling,” he said. “We don’t take on jobs saying ‘Yeah, we can do that in two days’ if there’s no possible way we can get it done in two days.”

Poised for the future

Tony Picillo works with the MBO folding machine.

While the recession hit many bindery and print finishing operations hard in the last decade, Hoffman said Shelly’s leadership helped Phillips Graphic Finishing weather the storm. “I think that Doug was very good at directing Phillips through the (recession),” he said. “He saw the economy getting worse, and he became much more lean in terms of doing business. He was focused on maintaining.”

Now that he is in charge, Hoffman would like to see Phillips do more packaging, kitting and special projects, utilizing the highly skilled handwork people already on staff. With the ability to produce all of the pieces for those projects in-house, he said doing fulfillment is the logical next step. “I see that as a growth area,” he said. “Even for some of the boxes and packaging that we already make, we can start doing the fulfillment for those items.”

He obviously wants Phillips to continue its pattern of growth. “We are focusing on new growth areas in terms of machinery and people,” Hoffman said. “We have had lots of success recently in the folder-gluer area working on consumer goods packaging. We recently purchased our second Bobst folder-gluer to double our capacity, and we feel that will be a driver for growth in the near term. This is an area of focus that will help us grow in the next few years.”

New Ownership Takes Hold at Seattle Bindery & Finishing

February 28, 2014

by Jen Clark, The Binding Edge

Seattle Bindery & Finishing serves the greater Seattle area and has customers throughout Washington state.

Tom Alvis always knew he wanted to be a business owner, but little did he know the opportunity would come knocking. Alvis, a long-time employee of Seattle Bindery, a Seattle, WA, postpress house specializing in custom tabs and presentation folders; folding and stitching; foil stamping, embossing and diecutting; plastic spiral, Wire-O®; perfect binding; and film laminating, recently purchased the trade bindery from Milt Vine, the longtime owner who had decided the time was right for retirement.

Vine approached Alvis with the idea in 2011, but “things didn’t really get going until November 2012. We closed in August 2013, so it was a fairly long timeline,” Alvis explained, noting Vine told him he was ready for another challenge. “He said he was still young enough to do something else. He had done this for 20 years. He was ready to close this chapter and move on. By the time the sale closed, he was ready for some time off. I don’t think he’s made any official decisions yet, but I do think he is enjoying retirement.”

While surprised at the offer, Alvis jumped at the chance to write the next chapter in Seattle Bindery’s 50-plus year history. “I had held many different positions with Seattle Bindery over the years; and when Milt approached me about purchasing the business, it caught me a little off guard,” he recalled. “I discussed the proposal with my wife, and we decided it would be a good move at this time.”

Over the last seven or eight years, Alvis and his wife, Janice, had been contemplating the purchase of a small business. They had their eyes on a typical franchise-type restaurant or something similar, though. “There was a smaller bindery that I had looked at a few years ago, but we decided that wasn’t feasible,” he said. “At the time, I had mentioned to Milt what was going on, and he off-handedly asked if I’d be interested in buying Seattle Bindery. At that point, it wasn’t feasible, which is why I was so surprised when he approached me again,” Alvis explained. “I didn’t think it would be financially feasible (this time), but we investigated, and we were able to reach a deal. We managed to get it all financed and made it happen.”

Looking back, Alvis said it made sense to purchase Seattle Bindery. “What better business to own than the one I had worked at for most of the last 25 years?” Alvis started his career there in 1990, but left a decade later. After a short stint with Safeco Insurance Company, he returned to Seattle Bindery in 2004. The economic downturn had an impact on the company, “and profits were not what they used to be, but the company was profitable,” Alvis said. “I felt that the timing was right, and that it was a good time to buy. I am counting on a recovering economy and my knowledge of both Seattle Bindery and the industry to keep the company on track and achieve success in the future.”

Even though the economy hasn’t completely bounced back, Alvis started seeing some improvement beginning in 2011. “Some of that was through a better economy and some through attrition of the competition,” he said. “I see the market staying flat in the short term and am hopeful for small growth once the economy starts moving.”

A look back

Founded in 1960, the company was first known as Seattle Litho Bindery. Ed Wood spent 30 years at the helm before selling the operation in 1991 to Vine, who had previously worked as a certified public accountant. “When Milt bought the company, it was known as Seattle Bindery and Mailing and was located in the south Lake Union area of Seattle,” Alvis said. “The company did traditional bindery work, along with mailing. At that time, folding and stitching were the main revenue producers, and the company had about 20 employees.”

For a little more than a decade, the company enjoyed steady growth and twice expanded its capabilities with the purchase of Ad Products in 1994 and Blake Letterpress in 1997. The first acquisition added custom index tabs and mechanical binding to the company’s capabilities, while the latter gave the company a full complement of postpress services, though it no longer handled mailing. To accommodate the update in services, the company changed its name to Seattle Bindery. In 1999, Seattle Bindery moved to its current location in Tukwila and grew to employ about 40 people. In 2004, the company added film laminating to its list of offerings.

After two recessions, Seattle Bindery had downsized to less than 20 employees when Alvis purchased the company in August of last year. As part of the sale, the company was renamed to Seattle Bindery & Finishing and has added four new full-time employees. “I have spent the first few months tweaking things and trying to improve the bottom line with a series of small changes,” he said. “We are always looking to add new services, equipment and employees, but each decision is based on value.” Alvis said he hasn’t made any major changes to the way the bindery operates. As for the employees, he said their reaction has been positive. “I’ve worked here for most of the last 25 years, so everyone pretty much knew me. We have a lot of long-time employees. I have a lot of friends who work for me, which is different, but so far, so good.”

Never a dull moment

Now that he’s the owner, Alvis’ work varies from day-to-day. He manages the company’s finishing operations – diecutting, foil stamping and folding/gluing. He also provides customer service for difficult or special projects and has administrative responsibilities. “I help out where needed,” he said. “My days never seem to turn out how I plan.”

Making the transition from employee to owner has been interesting, he said. A transition period helped Alvis ease into the role of owner. “Milt was on-site every day for 30 days. Then on an as-needed basis for another 30, and hes still available to me now,” Alvis explained. “Every now and then, I send him an email for something I need to know. As the days go by, that’s happening less and less.”

Since it took a little more than a year for the deal to finalize, Alvis said that gave him time to let everything sink in. “It’s a different set of challenges for sure,” he said. “A lot of day-to-day stuff hasn’t changed that much. Some is easier to do now, but it is difficult to find time to go out and do anything in the shop. But, I have run most of the equipment at one time or another, so occasionally I need to help out there. Other days, I may have to run out to visit a customer and consult on a complex job. And, unfortunately, some days are spent dealing with breakdowns or problem jobs.”

Despite having a financial stake in the business, Alvis said his wife has remained hands-off. “Her job is to be the bread-winner,” he joked. “She has a good job outside the industry. We’ve talked about her coming to work here. Eventually, it may happen.”

Alvis noted he finds the customer service angle much easier now that he’s in charge. “I’ve always enjoyed the customer service part of the job,” he said. “Getting to discuss projects and determining how we can help the customer out is very rewarding. It’s a situation where we can be creative to make things work. If we do a good job on something, the customer’s happy and their customer is happy too. There are good days and there are bad days. Sometimes people aren’t happy with you,” he said. “But, hopefully there are more good days than bad.”

Customer response to the change in ownership has been positive, too. “I’ve tracked the customer base,” Alvis said. “All of our customers are sticking with us; we’ve had a few that have wanted to review and renew their contracts – for the most part, that’s been positive. Doors are opening. That’s an area where things have improved a little bit. Sometimes customers see that things are changing and it gives them a chance to review things.”

Trends shape business

Alvis holds a folded piece that his company worked on for a client in the pharmaceutical industry.

Alvis said Seattle Bindery & Finishing serves the greater Seattle area and has customers throughout Washington State. “But we don’t have a typical job,” he noted. “Our biggest niche is that we do more under one roof than our competitors.” As an example, Alvis described a project that might entail 1,500 plastic coil books that consist of 92 pages and five Mylar index tabs that require foil-stamped front covers and a back covers with a glue-folded pocket. And customers are expecting their projects completed faster than ever. “Thats the main trend I see,” he said. “Fast turnaround time; more and more digital printing and short-run jobs. This has been the trend for the last decade. We actually downsized our perfect binding so we could be competitive on short-run jobs and decided to get out of the large-run market.”

Eyeletting is one of the more recent additions to the binderys list of services. Alvis said some customers use them for decoration rather than function: “Theyll put an eyelet on a business card just for the industrial look.”

Alvis said people are willing to spend money on print because they want a great or unusual look. “Our bindery can be a big part of that. Customers want less bulk mailers and more “designer” brochures, business cards or presentation folders. We have responded to this over the years by adding many services, such as eyeleting, which can be used to achieve an “industrial” look,” he said. “That has turned out to be a great little machine. Some customers use them as decoration rather than functionality. We’ve done jobs for people where they’ll put an eyelet on a business card just for the industrial look.”

At this point, Alvis hasn’t added any new services to the shop. The decision to add anything new will depend on customer feedback, he said. Current bindery services include folding, presentation folder gluing, stitching, trimming, rotary perforation and scoring, gathering and collating, perfect binding, Wire-O, plastic spiral, transfer tap, drilling, round cornering, shrink wrapping, eyeleting, film laminating and UV coating. Its tabbing operation includes custom index tabs, copier tabs, tab reinforcing, spine reinforcing, patch edge reinforcing and five-hole drilling. Finishing capabilities include autoplaten diecutting, diecutting up to 41″, scoring and perforating; embossing, foiling and numbering.

Focused on the future

With a renewed energy, Alvis and his staff are working out of the same 30,000 square foot building Vine leased and relocated the company to in 1999. At the time, Vine reported the new space provided “an open work area” that allowed “production managers … to see the entire floor.” The move allowed Seattle Bindery to finish jobs more quickly, which helped customer service. It also provided room to grow.

Seattle Bindery & Finishing’s equipment includes a Heidelberg Quickbinder, two Scott 10000 tabbers, a Bobst autoplaten diecutter, three MBO folders, two McCain stitchers, a Kluge Omni folder/gluer, three Heidelberg cylinder letterpresses, three Heidelberg platen letterpresses, a 20×28″ platen foil press, a Kluge EHD foil/diecut platen press, a Stahl pharmaceutical folder and two cutters. The company also operates both single- and double-sided film laminating machines. “A new piece of equipment that I have my eye on is rather expensive,” he said. “Every now and then a rebuilt one comes on the market. Theyre still not cheap, but are more affordable. Thats what were saving for… so when it comes along we can jump on it. Hopefully I’ll have it sooner rather than later.” While he declined to name what equipment hed like to purchase, he did say “it would allow us to offer another “unique” service.”

Alvis has another area he’d like to see Seattle Bindery & Finishing expand into, although he considers it more of a “long-term” project. “I’d like to explore more packaging work, such as paperboard cartons,” he said. “That would mean adding a straight-line gluer to our operation.”

In the meantime, Alvis said he’s focusing on the task at hand – making Seattle Bindery & Finishing a success. “We are currently negotiating a new seven-year lease, so we plan on being around and doing trade bindery in this region for a long time,” he said. “We are working on improving what we already do in the short-term. We want it to be easy for our customers to do business with us.”

Family Ties at Reindl Bindery Company

November 15, 2013

by Jen Clark, The Binding Edge

David Reindl, right, and his brother Steven Reindl took the helm of the company in 2007. David Reindl is the company’s president, while Steven Reindl is the vice president.

Being nice and treating people fairly is more than a business philosophy at Reindl Bindery Company. It is how owners David and Steven Reindl were raised and how they, in turn, are raising their own families. But as a business philosophy, the mantra has proven beneficial for both employee longevity and sales.

The pair grew up at the full-service bindery, now located in Germantown, WI, which was started in 1978 when their grandfather and father went into business together. Over the years, Reindl Bindery has become a leader in the printing and publishing industries. The company is known for its award-winning quality, responsive service and innovative binding solutions.

“The biggest reason we are successful is because of our ability to change and adapt to the needs of our customers,” David Reindl said, noting those needs have changed a lot over the years. “It also is important for us to treat our people as family. We take an interest in our employees’ lives. I think it’s important to recognize all that they do.”

Father, son venture out on their own

In 1978, Charles Reindl was ready for something new. The 43-year veteran at Boehm Bindery decided it was time to venture out on his own. Charles’ son, Dale, who was teaching printing at a Milwaukee high school at the time, also had been considering a career change. “My dad was at the point in his career that he was looking to do something different,” David said. “He had been teaching for many years. I think he had had enough of teaching at that point.” The father and son had worked together before at Boehm Bindery, and Dale had continued to work part-time at the facility when he was in high school and while on break from college. Creating their own bindery “was an idea (my dad) had always toyed with. It was just the perfect opportunity,” David explained.

At first, Reindl Bindery took on small binding jobs and book repair for Bibles and text books. The company was located on the second floor of a building in Milwaukee, WI, and it grew as it purchased a few smaller pieces of used equipment to manufacture different types of books. In 1980, Reindl purchased the assets of Boehm Bindery and moved to a new location on North 3rd Street. Reindl then was able to produce casebound books, as well as perform other operations, making for a more versatile and complete trade bindery. In 1988, Reindl purchased a building in Elm Grove, WI, and moved for the second time. New developments within the industry allowed Reindl to be even more aggressive and after several machinery purchases, Reindl began competing nationwide and delving into new niche markets.

In 1998, Reindl moved to Glendale, WI, to accommodate the growth of its bindery offerings and customer base. Another move in 2009 put Reindl Bindery in its current 112,000 sq. ft. facility. “At times, it isn’t enough space, but at others, it’s more than enough,” David said. “For a company our size, we are in a building that is the right size right now. Were lucky though. If it comes to it, we have the ability to add floor space if needed.”

Next generation takes over

David Reynosa talks with David Reindl about a job in which the corners of covers need to be trimmed so the cover can be wrapped around board.

In 2007, David and his brother, Steven, took over the company from their parents, Dale and Kathy. David is the company’s president, while Steven is the vice president and Dale remains chairman of the board. “They have no active ownership in the business,” David said of his parents, “but my dad is here when he wants to be here, and he’s not when he’s enjoying retirement. He’s sort of semi-retired. He takes part in production meetings and new product development. He kind of comes and goes,” David said with a laugh. “I think he’s enjoying it a lot.”

The brothers, though, have had a role at Reindl Bindery from the beginning. “We all started when the company was founded in 1978 – I was nine years old,” David said. “We were brought in on Saturdays – I think to give my mom a break from dealing with three kids.” The boys’ jobs were far from glamorous and involved cleaning bathrooms and emptying trash cans while their father worked in the shop. This bindery is “what I’ve done since I was nine years old – in one aspect or another. We’ve both been here since the beginning,” David said. “It’s a strange feeling just switching ownership because weve been involved actively since the beginning,” he said. “We already were here doing the work – it was just a matter of making it official.”

The brothers work well together, with their personalities balancing one another. “We don’t butt heads very often,” David explained. “I would say it’s a good system of checks and balances. He’s very calm and level-headed. I’m more aggressive. We balance each other out. We rarely have any kind of conflict, but (when we do) we’re tolerant of each other’s opinions. We bring different viewpoints to the table. We have the ability to look at things from different angles.”

And, just as his father did, David brings his young children in on the weekends to get a feel for the family business. “At this point in their lives, they like to play office and go look around in the shop,” he said. But that doesn’t mean he’s pushing them into the bindery. “I would never push them to do it,” he said. “They have a long way to go before they need to make that kind of decision. I hope they would [join the business], but that’s going to be up to them.”

Family atmosphere engages employees

Scott Hill removes product from the Stahl folder at Reindl Bindery.

Even though Reindl Bindery is hiring, most of the 55 current employees have been there for 10 years or more. “Some employees have more than 20 years with the company,” David said. “The longevity is remarkable.” He attributed the loyalty to the company’s family atmosphere. One way David accomplishes that is by saying “hello” to everyone each and every day that he is at the facility. He also lets employees know how important they are to the bindery’s success. “I make a point of being around when our employees meet to get their assignments. I want them to know how important they are,” he said, noting the employees appreciate the personal interaction.

“We try to be polite and treat people nicely,” David explained. “They are our most important asset. Without them, we would be in trouble. I think it’s important to recognize what they do. Even though it’s their job and they get paid for it, I think thanking them at the end of the day for what they’ve done is important. And they appreciate that. We hold them accountable, but say thank you. It’s simple, really: Be pleasant and treat people nicely.”

State-of-the-art technology – combined with a highly experienced work force – allows Reindl Bindery to provide a solutions-based approach to meets its customers’ needs. The full service bindery serves three major markets, including education, entertainment and trade. Capabilities include cover making, casebinding, perfect binding, mechanical binding, cutting, folding, drilling, foil stamping, collating, tipping, tab cutting, round cornering, shrink wrapping and DVD/CD. Reindl mounts trays and pockets to house CDs and DVDs for several media venues such as education, music, movies, television shows and more. It also produces single or multiple panel covers for use in casebinding, wire-o and for other applications such as game boards. Cover materials, whether printed and laminated, cloth or coated, are wrapped around the board that best suits each job. Casebinding jobs can be bound in various ways, too – Smyth sewn, side sewn or adhesive bound.

“Our goal is to solve our customers’ issues and make it simple to work with us,” David said. “We do this by hiring the best people we can and instilling our company’s philosophy in each of them.” While there is no formal training process for new employees, existing operators serve as mentors by showing them the ropes. “It’s not a formalized apprenticeship,” he explained. “We look for people with mechanical aptitude and then train them to the situation by pairing them with a current operator for a period of time.”

The timelines for training new and existing operators vary, depending on the situation. When new equipment is installed, Reindl takes advantage of the training provided by the manufacturer, though not all training takes place in-house. “For example, when we put our newest perfect binder in, we sent all of our operators to Germany for training,” David said. “It’s such an important part of getting all that you can out of the equipment. You have to invest in your people. Sometimes it’s a lot harder because youre under the gun with various projects, but you have to do it because it’s better for the long-term.”

Finding success in a changing industry

In the last decade, digital publishing and changes in how people consume information have been problematic for many in the binding industry. As shorter runs became the norm, though, Reindl Bindery didn’t make significant changes to its model. “We have gone about our business,” David said.

Job orders, he said, vary between short- and long-runs. “We are seeing a haphazard work load,” David said. “We have some incredibly large orders mixed right in with small- and mid-range orders. We just ran a perfect bound job that was a quantity of 250. We also just finished a 400,000-piece hardcover job. There is no consistency, and you just never know what you’re going to get on any given day.” Taking those challenges in stride shows clients how flexible Reindl Bindery can be to work with. “Often, creative scheduling of overtime and additional shifts is the only way to make it all work,” he said.

The addition of new equipment over the last few years, such as a high-speed casing-in line and a high-speed PUR perfect binder, has given Reindl Bindery the ability to price differently because makeready and run times are faster. “Ideally, you can invest in equipment that will allow you to remain competitive,” David said. “We make our sales on our ability to always make our deliveries and take care of our customers. That always is how we’ve done business.”

Reindl Bindery offers clients creative solutions, on-the-mark estimating, best-in-class production, quality assurance and on-time delivery no matter a project’s size. It has found a niche within the entertainment industry with high-profile work that has a worldwide audience. The company produces items for the music and motion picture industries, as well as lower quantity items for local customers.

“We work on titles that are known and that are popular in the US and across the world. We work on a lot of different products with national recognition that put us in a spot that a lot of companies aren’t in because the high-profile things we are doing are pretty remarkable,” said David.

Reindl Bindery recently won a Product of Excellence Award from the Binding Industries Association for its work on a piece for the movie The Dark Knight Rises. The award recognizes the use of glue for finishing other than binding, where the application is intrinsic to the purpose of the piece, David said. “For Dark Knight Rises, we used a lenticular application without waves and made it flush to the board. Because of the UV coating, we used PUR. We had to adjust the glue pattern and build a pressing roller to pull the piece through, so it would flatten without damaging the piece. The outcome was an award-winning product that people everywhere could buy.”

Reindl Bindery also has won awards in various categories for its work on a “Friends” anniversary book that was part of a DVD collection for the hit television show; the Wausau West Yearbook; a collection of CDs titled “Paul Simon: Graceland 25th Anniversary Edition”; and a specialty hardcover book that accompanied the Bio Shock video game. The “Friends” project was an oblong book with coated stock that required making various adjustments to the machines. The Paul Simon and Bio Shock projects consisted of a lot of handwork, and the book featured tinted pages to give it a weathered feel. “For Paul Simon, the material needed to be cleaned and our machines had to be modified for the larger size of the piece. We used foam to form the inside pocket as a guide and to protect the piece during shipping so that it wouldn’t bend,” David explained.

“What we put out there are things that challenge us a little bit,” he said of the competitions the company enters. “If we win something for that, then it’s all the better. Obviously, when youre showing people your office, it’s nice to have awards all over the walls. It shows your work is at an award-winning level. It becomes a marketing tool for us.”

“Winning, for us, is like a pat on the back,” he explained. “It’s verification that we’re doing the absolute best for our customers. We take the most pride in awards that highlight things that “couldn’t be done”. That’s where you really show your level of service to your customers.”

Another hurdle for the binding industry is work that has been lost to foreign companies – ones that can produce materials that traditionally take longer, but can be completed at a cheaper rate. To combat that trend, Reindl Bindery has become more aggressive in its marketing and customer contact. “I’m personally out on the road,” David said. “We don’t have an outside sales force. I’m the one going out and meeting with customers.”

The approach is paying off because Reindl Bindery is growing its customer base. “Our marketing mostly is customer contact and website updates. We don’t send out mailers, but we do send out our company calendar each year,” he said, adding the distribution list gets larger and larger every year. “We’ve added multiple customers each month, a remarkable achievement, over the last eight to nine months. I’m using my time to get out there in front of customers and potential customers. I’m on the road several times each year, visiting places like Los Angeles and New York, as well as the central part of the country and locally – northern Illinois and Wisconsin.”

David attributes the company’s success to its ability to change and adapt to the needs of its customers. “And they’ve changed a lot over the years,” he said. “If you looked at our company five years ago, we have evolved so much. We look different, but we still do the things we’ve done from the beginning. We’ll never forget where we came from, but we have to be forward-thinking and looking at ways to compete against not only competitors in our country, but competitors in countries like Mexico and China.”

Innovation and creativity are the keys to retaining business that otherwise might go to foreign competitors, he said. “That’s where a big portion of our work will come from. I’m proud to say that is some of the stuff we’re starting to achieve. Being able to compete against Mexico is a big deal.”

Simplicity plays a role as well. “We try to make our customers’ lives as simple as we can,” David said. “It is the key to our success. It doesn’t make our lives simple – it’s exactly the opposite. But by making our customers feel like coming to us is simple, that is how we win.”

Allied Bindery: Bound for Excellence

August 21, 2013

by Jen Clark, The Binding Edge

Like most trade binderies, Allied Bindery has observed trends in smaller run quantities, quicker turn-around time requirements, changing raw materials and an overall reduction in marketplace demand as the digital world continues to expand. To place the company apart from the competition, Allied Bindery set a high standard of customer satisfaction, added service capabilities and provided customers with the opportunity for one-stop shopping for virtually all their finishing needs.

The addition of ISO certification in 2002 put the company, located in the Detroit metro area, on a path to pursue excellence and deliver results for the benefit of its customers. It has expertise in a broad line of trade bindery finishing services and provides flexibility in its operations by always looking for ways to say “yes” to customers, said Ed Doyle, Allied Bindery’s managing director.

While it serves many markets, a large portion of Allied Bindery’s revenue comes from the automotive sector. “The automotive industry is our largest vertical market, accounting for over half our revenue,” he said. “We are two-up, small book specialists. We provide up-front design collaboration with our customers and have the most extensive error proofing and quality assurance systems in the industry.”

“They saw a need …”

Allied Bindery was founded in 1986 by Frank Cancro and Dan Maliniak in Madison Heights, MI. Both had extensive experience in the printing industry and were entrepreneurial in nature. “They saw a need and opportunity for a top-quality trade bindery to serve the southeast Michigan print community,” Doyle said. The company grew out of its original location and moved to its current home – a 50,000 square foot warehouse-style facility – in 1995. “We have a pretty unique building,” Doyle said. “It can accommodate the influx of work we get, but also we can store items for customers in our warehouse space for later delivery.”

Allied Bindery established a reputation for excellence and quality, “which continues to this day,” Doyle noted. As the owners neared retirement age, the company was sold to a group of six investors in 1999, with Doyle taking the helm. “Our background is in the auto supply business,” he said of his fellow investors. “We saw opportunities where we could enhance systems to what Allied Bindery already provided. We went through a due diligence process and felt there was an opportunity for growth. Allied had a good track record leading up to the sale. The company was well established and had a good reputation in the marketplace, which made it an attractive asset.”

Over the years, the company expanded its clientele to include customers in Ohio, Indiana and throughout all of Michigan, “with several national accounts as well,” Doyle added. For the automotive industry, Allied Bindery creates automotive manual-related products that find their way into the glove boxes of American-, German- and Japanese-manufactured vehicles. “We make millions of those books every year, but there really is no “typical job,” Doyle said. “While our processes are highly systematized, trade finishing remains custom work. Each job utilizes unique raw materials and poses unique challenges to finish on time and to the customer’s required quality level. This is consistently achieved by an experienced and talented employee group.”

After the ownership change, Allied Bindery pursued and achieved ISO 9001:2000 status, and in 2008, updated to the ISO 9001:2008 standard. According to the International Organization for Standardization, ISO certification ensures that materials, products, processes and services are fit for their purpose. It provides strategic tools that reduce costs by minimizing waste and errors, as well as increase productivity.

“Part of the adoption of our ISO system is a culture of continuous improvement in all aspects of our business processes,” Doyle explained. “It is a task that is constantly pursued, yet by definition, is never completed. We constantly encourage our customers to provide comments and suggestions to help ensure the best possible quality and value throughout the supply chain.”

Allied Bindery employs 35 people across two shifts covering 24 hours a day, but adds contract and temporary employees “as business conditions warrant,” Doyle said. “We have a lot of long-time employees. There are people here who were here when we bought the company. We have a lot of good, talented people, and we have a very accommodating and flexible workforce.”

Working toward a “Zero Defect” environment

Allied Bindery’s current capabilities include perfect binding with PUR and hot melt adhesive, as well as layflat, notch and tape binding. Additional trade bindery services include cutting, folding, saddlestitching, loop stitching, shrinkwrapping, round cornering, drilling, collating and fulfillment. Mechanical binding services include twin loop (wire-o), semi-concealed wire-o, concealed wire-o, plastic coil, tab cutting, Mylar reinforcing and calendar tinning. Mechanical binding and special project services were added in 2011, while calendar tinning was added in 2012.

The company utilizes two Kolbus perfect binders – 20- and 28-pocket collator and binder systems, which give Allied Bindery the opportunity to handle very large projects. In addition, the bindery runs Muller Martini saddlestitchers, MBO folding equipment, a Polar cutting system from Heidelberg and various pieces of mechanical binding equipment. As part of its on-going commitment to quality, Allied Bindery has invested heavily in numerous error-proofing technologies. “We view these technologies as “killer apps,” Doyle said. “They kill problems before they ever have the chance to reach our customers.”

It was the first trade bindery in the upper Midwest to implement OptiGraph digital camera signature recognition systems on perfect binding lines; integrate high-speed computerized weigh scales into perfect binding lines; and design and integrate high-speed video cameras into perfect binding lines to detect and remove skewed or improperly registered books from the production stream. In addition, Allied Bindery also was the first trade bindery in North America to implement a ProControl adhesive application sensor and measurement system on perfect binding lines. Other technologies include electronic sensors and mechanical calipers to automatically detect incorrect signature pocket feeds and integrated electronics that automatically shut down production equipment when triggered by error-proofing devices.

Allied Bindery’s goal is zero defects, but like any trade binder, it is subject to the raw materials it is provided. “That plays a large part in quality and productivity,” Doyle said. “We have nine or 10 individual checks and balances, so our issues are very minor. The core issues of pagination and adhesion have been eliminated from our business as a problem.” These internal quality control standards have become an effective tool, he added. “Our system is designed to catch a mistake quickly – hopefully always before it gets to a customer.”

Developing a better adhesive

In 2003, the company adopted PUR adhesive technology in its perfect binding operations, partnering with Nordson Corporation and Henkel Adhesives in implementing the first extrusion slot delivery system at a trade bindery in North America. “At the time it was very new technology,” Doyle said, noting it had been tried in Europe. “The process was developed by Nordson. We did different trials and worked with different formulas for about a year before we installed it.”

Doyle said a trend within the printing industry led Allied Bindery to seek a new way of handling PUR material. “There were a lot of different materials being sent our way that weren’t virgin paper material. There was a need for a more robust adhesive technology than hot melt. PUR adhesive fits the bill well because it will adhere to anything, but it has unique characteristics when you process it.”

Once PUR adhesives get exposed to humidity in the atmosphere, he explained, it starts to cure. “Unless you’re running 24 hours, you’re forced to drain that pot each night and clean it out,” Doyle said. Because the extrusion system is a closed system, the adhesive isn’t exposed to the atmosphere until it goes on the book, he explained. In addition, it eliminates wasted glue, and clean-up time is reduced each night. “It is a very, very quick process at the end of the day,” Doyle said, “but maintaining it on a preventative basis is important. If you take care of your system, it will take care of you.”

Allied Bindery also has served as a beta test site, working with equipment and material vendors in jointly developing quality-based application technologies and serving as an industry leader in implementation. For example, in conjunction with Henkel, Allied Bindery has undertaken a long-term research and development project to improve PUR adhesive performance characteristics, helping to develop the next generation of PUR products.

“One of the issues with PUR is while the final cure is much stronger and durable, it doesn’t cure as immediately as hot melt,” Doyle said. “When you run a book with PUR, it needs to cure before being handled, whereas with hot melt it is ready immediately.” Curing time can vary depending on the time of year. Doyle said it can be as much as 24 hours in the winter, but eight to 10 in the summer.

“We’re continuing to work with Henkel so the company can modify its chemical formulas to try and get the adhesive to cure faster without losing its flexibility,” he said. “It is something that has improved over the years, but isn’t quite there yet.”

Customer service takes center stage

Customer service starts with proactive, high-quality communication that results in mutual understanding with customers from original estimate through design assistance, current job status, pre-notification of all observable print-related issues prior to the addition of finishing costs and final shipment timing notification.

Partnering with like-minded firms, Allied Bindery also provides solutions for customers by acting as a project manager for all postpress finishing needs, delivering jobs within the quality, delivery and cost parameters required by its customers. “The traditional print world is challenged with digital displacement,” he said. “We have to be a low-cost producer. We have to utilize our quality to attract new customers. We have to be careful because we cant do things that will compete with our customers – the print community.”

Doyle said Allied Bindery has become a high-volume assembler or manufacturer of small items. “We can do small types of assembly with the things that we create. We look for partnerships with marketing firms or advertising agencies to utilize those skills,” he said. “We’re not going to become a software company – that’s not our core capability.”

In addition, it provides customers access to internal trucking operations to pick up and/or deliver customer materials within a 100- to 150-mile radius 20 hours a day to meet the most time-sensitive customer needs. “We’ve invested heavily in it,” Doyle said of the trucking operation. “It helps give us a competitive advantage and allows for flexibility.”

Allied Bindery has won numerous awards for its workmanship and commitment to its customers. It has been recognized by a southeast Michigan-based printer, operating globally, as its “Supplier of the Year” five years in a row. The Detroit Club of Printing House Craftsmen has awarded Allied Bindery gold and silver awards for “Superb Craftsmanship in Production” over the last several years; and in 2010, the Printing Industries of Michigan recognized Allied Bindery with three Gold Ink Awards. It also earned a “Certificate of Merit” for Product Excellence from the Binding Industries Association.

Doyle said the company’s goal moving forward is to continue “to delight our customers every day with outstanding service, communication, collaboration, quality and value. There is no substitute for excellence in the blocking and tackling of everyday business processes, especially those that directly impact our customers.”

Silvanus Products: Artisans in the Custom Packaging Market

May 20, 2013

by Jen Clark, The Binding Edge

Silvanus Products won a 2012 BIA Product of Excellence Award in the Innovative Use of Materials category for its work on the Blue Wine Menu.

Old-fashioned work ethic and attention to detail have made Silvanus Products, Inc. a leader in the loose leaf industry, not only for the products it produces, but for the expert craftsmanship of its long-time employees. Located 60 miles south of St. Louis, MO, in the historic town of Ste. Genevieve, Silvanus has been providing innovative custom products to merchandising groups, dealers, banks and knowledgeable buyers since 1929. It manufactures vinyl specialty items, loose leaf binders, checkbook covers, portfolios, custom-made indexes and turned edge binders, as well as bank passbooks and more.

The company, along with its employees, has become known across the country for providing high-quality decorating techniques and service. The secret, according to Cathy Elliott, Silvanus’ customer service and purchasing manager, is its equipment, processes and people – who have “years and years of experience honing their craft.”

“Our rich heritage as a leader in creative packaging ideas for custom binders and banking products has helped us become a direct source manufacturer for “second-to-none” quality and economically priced custom binders,” she said. “Every Silvanus binder product features expert craftsmanship acquired from a rich history of manufacturing a wide variety of binder products.”

Humble Beginnings

Ed Schaefer founded what then was known as the General Passbook Company on Nov. 29, 1929. The plant had six employees who manufactured bank stationery products, passbooks, savings books and other paper-related items. In the early 1950s, the company began manufacturing vinyl loose leaf binders, check book covers and related products. In 1977, Schaefer sold General Passbook Company to The Georgia-Pacific Corporation, National Cover Division – a company that had been a long-time competitor. Corporate restructuring in 1983 took almost immediate action to discontinue operations that were not closely associated with Georgia-Pacific’s building and paper product business.

The Ste. Genevieve facility was sold on April 27, 1984, to a local group that included five former Georgia-Pacific employees. The principle financial backer was Robert Rottler, a life-long Ste. Genevieve resident. Renamed Silvanus Products, the company officially began production of stationary and index products on May 2, 1984. After purchasing new equipment and materials, the company began producing vinyl products in September 1984.

Silvanus Products continued to grow and added turned edge products to its long list of offerings. The company now produces a variety of binders; custom- or standard-format index tabs; bank and financial items; and other products including menu and diploma covers, writing portfolios, clip folders, pouches, custom turned edge boxes, presentation kits, various custom-made vinyl products and more.

Silvanus’ customers are more than pleased with the workmanship on their projects. “True artisans in custom vinyl and turned edge binders, boxes and informational packaging products,” one customer wrote in a testimonial.

“Our customer set a timetable that was next to impossible to accomplish and your company performed in an amazing fashion,” said another, noting the knowledgeable staff “rolled with the punches without complaint or hesitation.”

Another client reiterated that sentiment: “Silvanus Products is the company I turn to when clients come up with seemingly impossible designs. The company will tackle new designs, work with unusual materials, develop new techniques to accomplish our client’s goal and deliver the product our competitors say can’t be made.”

BIA Honors Longtime Leader

Former CEO Vernon Schwent was inducted into the Binding Industries Association Hall of Fame in April 2013. He is shown here with Cathy Elliott, Silvanus customer service and purchasing manager.

In April, Silvanus’ former Chief Executive Officer Vernon Schwent was inducted into the Binding Industries Association Hall of Fame. Since 2008, the Hall of Fame highlights industry pioneers whose hard work and determination have created a vibrant, growing and changing industry. And, while Schwent was honored for the accolades, he didn’t feel that he deserved all the credit. “I alone did not contribute to the success of the company,” Schwent said. “Everyone who has worked hard here earned this award. It took all of the Silvanus employees to make it a great company to work for.”

That humble attitude is Schwent’s character, Elliott explained. “He worked many long hours and on weekends for years,” she said of his dedication to the company. “That is why we are known in the industry for our superior decorating techniques. He spent hours developing these techniques. He learned by trial and error because he wanted success for the company, not on his behalf, but for the employees.”

Schwent received nominations from industry peers, including Earl Vogt, retired president and CEO of Mecom Ltd., Indianapolis, IN; Connie Jones, president of Rimco Marketing Products, Inc., Orlando, FL; Rick Seibel, president of Binder Graphics, Inc., Lees Summit, MO; and Melvin Weight, owner of Di-Mel Associates, Fountain Valley, CA.

Vogt supported the nomination with a letter detailing his experience working with Schwent. The pair worked together for more than a decade at the General Passbook Company. Several years later, when the company became known as Silvanus Products, Schwent became its vice president. “Vernon spent his entire career in the loose leaf industry, and he led Silvanus to become one of the top and most respected companies in the industry with products and service that have no equal,” Vogt wrote.

In announcing the nomination, Justin Goldstein, BIA director, said Schwent was being honored “for his excellence, creative abilities and service to others in the industry. He has produced some of the most creative and unique binders and accessory products in the industry, and many decorative techniques used today were developed by Schwent and his staff.”

While Vogt and Schwent worked together at General Passbook Company, Vogt noticed Schwent’s great work ethic. “It fit in with my desire to make (the company) a major player in the loose leaf industry,” Vogt wrote. “During those 12 years, Vernon developed into an excellent leader. He would take any and all challenges and work his heart out to provide great products for our customers – with a 99 percent on-time delivery record. In those 12 years, we never had a month that our output did not exceed the previous months.”

Vogt left the company in 1977, shortly before Georgia-Pacific purchased General Passbook. Schwent assumed the duties of the commercial group, which included all loose leaf and a wide variety of vinyl products, along with some purchasing and tool design, Vogt explained. In 1983, when the Ste. Genevieve facility resumed production of loose leaf and bank products, Schwent was elected to the vice president position and took charge of the commercial aspects of the company.

In 1990, the pair again began working together, but with Vogt as a Silvanus customer. “Sometimes we asked for almost impossible deliveries, like calling late on a Friday for delivery on the following Tuesday. Vernon would work all weekend to get our orders to us on time with excellent quality.”

Schwent, who retired in 2004, made hands-on learning and development a mainstay for every employee. “He wanted you to learn and understand each product construction and the various ways we could use decoration,” said Elliott, who worked with Schwent for 17 years. “With customer service employees understanding the product, we then could teach our brokers, who then could sell the item to the end user. We were very much hands-on with product design and decoration. It was fun looking at new artwork or a logo and coming up with an idea that would make the design be over the top. It was very unique, hands-on training.”

Despite his retirement, Schwent still has a hand in the business and remains on Silvanus board of directors. “He helps guide with decision-making based on his years of expertise and knowledge,” Elliott said.

Family Atmosphere Keeps Employees Engaged

The company’s board of directors include, from left: Steve Rottler, president; Vernon Schwent; Norma Rottler, owner; John Burgert, retired sales manager; Rick Schaefer, accountant; and Terry Rottler, attorney.

Executives at Silvanus are quick to point out the secret to the company’s success is its employees, many of whom boast tenures of 20, 30 or 40 years. The employees are passionate, enthusiastic and knowledgeable about their craft and work hard to meet and exceed customer expectations. “We are excellent at what we do because our employees have so many years of experience,” said Paula Kuder, a customer service representative for Silvanus’ commercial products. “I’ve been here for more than 20 years, and there are many with more tenure than me.”

That’s because the culture is built around product quality, starting with the members of its team. Every Silvanus product features expert craftsmanship acquired from its history of manufacturing a wide variety of products. “The atmosphere is that we are a family,” Elliott said. “Our employees have a long-term relationship here. They take pride in the jobs they produce and enjoy working together. People stay if they like what they are doing and where they are working.”

Even though recent struggles with the economy hit many businesses hard, Silvanus was able to weather the storm thanks, in part, to its dedicated employees. “We are located in a small town in Eastern Missouri. There are many people without a job in this small community due to business closings over the past few years. Thankfully, we have not had to look for new employees with the dedicated workforce we have here,” said Elliott.

Plant operations include a full-service office staff, with accounting, human resources, sales, customer service, estimating and order entry. The Vinyl Manufacturing group consists of graphics, cutting, silkscreen, stamping, sealing, diemaking, turned edge, vacuum forming and assembly departments. The Bank Manufacturing group consists of the printing department, dark room, layout and both offset and letter press printing presses, while the Passbook group consists of sewing, cutting, tipping, diecutting and folding. Also, there is an index tab department that makes standard or custom index tabs.

“Our team is very knowledgeable about our products and decoration techniques,” Elliott said. “We are able to help customers with product design, materials and decorations. When we send out samples, people are sold on the quality and service.”

Decorating Techniques Take Center Stage

Specialty decorating techniques have become a niche for Silvanus. “We offer the finest decorating services in the industry,” Elliott said.

For each job, Silvanus employees challenge every age-old standard of binder decorating that exists. An eye for detail and familiarity with the equipment helps produce designs that are enhanced with multi-color silkscreening, 4-color process screening, foil stamping, embossing or debossing (blind or color filled), reverse screen overlay, picture perfect and applique. In addition, Silvanus offers digital printing for short-run 4-color binder needs.

Specialty techniques that were developed by Schwent and his staff include reverse applique, reverse screen overlay and picture perfect, to name a few. “Our registration for silkscreen debossing and foil stamp debossing is perfect,” Elliott said. “The keys are knowing how to order the dies and being able to get the guides set-up on the machines so they are dead on. You have to train your people to have a good eye, which is exactly what Vernon did.”

Workers are trained on a variety of equipment that fills the shop floor, including electronic sealing, cutting, riveting, sewing, creasing, foil stamping, diecutting, embossing and Mylar reinforcing machines; sheet fed printing presses; silkscreening presses; turntables and autoloaders; casemakers for oversized and high-volume turned edge products; a vacuum former; and several units dedicated to creating index tabs, in addition to miscellaneous printing and manufacturing machinery.

Silvanus has won several industry awards for its work, including three first place awards in this year’s BIA Product of Excellence Awards. Last year, it earned a first, second and third place award in the BIA competition. Previously, Silvanus was honored with two SCROLL Golden Ring Awards for Best of Show; two BIA Awards of Merit; and it earned BIA Decorative Reproduction of Excellence status.

Last year’s Product of Excellence winner was entitled “Blue” – a turned edge binder that was to be used for a wine list in an upscale restaurant. Silvanus also created companion pieces for lunch, dinner, dessert and drink menus. “What is unique about Blue is that the customer wanted to use a real copper material,” Elliott explained. “We had never worked with copper before, so I had sample material brought in so we could see how it could be applied with no sharp edges or corners. The decoration the customer wanted was a blind deboss – a little more of a challenge as we did not know how the material would accept our typical application.”

An Eye to the Future

While Silvanus has led the industry through numerous rounds of innovation, it remains poised for future development. The company recently began offering eco-friendly binders.

The cover and liner material is FSC®-certified and is made from 30-percent post-consumer waste. No harmful coatings are added in the manufacturing process. The chipboard interior is made from 100-percent recycled fibers, including a minimum of 35-percent post-consumer waste. The binder can be decorated with images, such as a company logo. The ring metal can be attached in a traditional manner or in a clip-on fashion. The clip-on metal easily can be removed and reused or recycled, making the binder completely biodegradable.

Adjusting to the current business climate of declining orders and quicker turnaround requests is something that all binderies are faced with. “Like all corporations, we’ve had to adjust to fit the customers’ current needs,” Elliott said. “Orders are smaller, yet we still maintain the quality, service and on-time deliveries our customers expect. We want to remain in business so we adjust to the demands. Previously, business came to us by word of mouth, and now that the buying markets have changed we are seeking new partnerships.”

Dillon Bindery Stakes a Claim with Open Pot PUR

February 1, 2013

by Jen Clark, The Binding Edge

With run quantities getting smaller and more print communications going online, Dillon Bindery, Milwaukee, WI, had a decision to make. The family-owned business staked a claim by specializing in 2008; it became the first trade bindery in Wisconsin to offer high-speed, large-run PUR binding utilizing the open pot application. “The wide variety of paper and coating combinations are becoming more challenging and specialty jobs attempting to grab the reader’s attention are becoming more complex, which makes the use of PUR adhesive that much more important,” said Joshua Schroeckenthaler, vice president.

It wasn’t the first time that Dillon Bindery had diversified its offerings to meet its customers’ changing needs. Roy Schroeckenthaler purchased the small company in 1953, retained its name and operated it out of rented space on the third floor of its present location. As the business grew, so did Dillon Bindery’s reputation as a quality provider of binding and finishing services. Roy Schroeckenthaler purchased the building in 1964 and moved operations to the first floor. In 1978, the company began offering perfect binding, recognizing the need to diversify because of changing technology and greater demand for specialized service.

In 1997, Dillon Bindery expanded into mechanical binding. When Roy retired three years later, his son David Schroeckenthaler purchased the business. The company’s growth continued and in 2005, it added an automatic book drilling line. In 2008, it added a second perfect binding line. In 2010, Dillon Bindery added two more automatic book drilling lines and converted its other perfect binder to PUR, enabling the company to offer PUR on all perfect bound books.

Much of the company’s growth occurred in the midst of the worst recession since the Great Depression. According to Printing Industries of America, the Great Recession, which officially lasted from December 2007 to June 2009, shrunk print’s economic footprint by historic proportions. In 2008, the number of US printing plants declined to 33,565 and employment dropped to 909,200. The industry lost another 2,943 plants and more than 67,000 employees in 2009. Despite this, David Schroeckenthaler said, Dillon Bindery’s “growth was required to meet the needs and demands of our customers.”

Overcoming Obstacles with PUR

PUR adhesive is an alternative to other binding adhesives in the paperback book binding industry. It aids in overall performance and is a solution to ever increasing paper changes. “Printers are using more high-end products that require a lot of different coatings on the paper,” Joshua explained. “They are constantly changing the coatings and ink coverage. They’re also using heavier stocks. It was becoming a problem to get the book to perform the way the customer wanted it to.” Added David, “PUR overcomes a lot of those obstacles.”

In most cases, PUR is used to enhance the performance of page pulls and flexes to make a stronger book. A variety of factors, including proper spine preparation and residual print solvents, influence the ability of an adhesive to perform. Short fibers from recycled paper reduce the ability of an adhesive to bond to pages, while coated stocks, clay, aqueous coatings, varnishes and/or UV coatings can be difficult surfaces to bond. In addition, signature thickness and mixed paper stock can add stress to the glue line.

PUR-bound books have higher performance levels than similarly bound books using standard hot melt (EVA). The thin, tough and flexible nature of PUR enables the pages to open easily and have some lay-flat characteristics, “although PUR is not lay-flat binding,” David noted. PUR is resistant to a variety of inks and solvents, which can cause EVA hot melts to fail and leads to costly rebinds. In addition, PUR offers resistance to temperature extremes, which is beneficial during shipping and storage.

The combination of a poor adhesive with an inferior application method can be disastrous. Most binderies that offer PUR, Joshua explained, use the spray-on method because it is more economical. “They go with that because there is a waste factor,” he said. “Once PUR is exposed to air, it starts to set up or cure. So, they go with the spray-on system because it is more cost-effective as far as wasting the glue is concerned. Glue is expensive.”

Dillon Bindery utilizes the open pot application method, meaning technicians fill up the pot at the beginning of the day and drain it at the end of the day, repeating the process each day. “This process requires us to discard about $90 worth of glue between both binders each day,” Joshua estimated. “It becomes a cost factor for some people, but we’re not looking to save cost on the material. We’d rather put together a higher quality product instead of worrying about saving money on the material.”

Besides, the spray-on method has a higher spine failure rate, he added. “People view PUR as a magic glue, but it’s not just ‘a glue.’ It’s the application process. It’s how you prep the book and apply the glue. The spine preparation and the glue still is a big part of making sure you have a successful product at the end.”

The Schroeckenthalers agreed that PUR binding has become the company’s specialty. “Our customers can bind with a variety of stocks and coatings,” David said. “They aren’t limited to what they can use. They don’t have to worry about full ink coverage or the coverage of their coating.”

Dillon Bindery works closely with its glue supplier and tests various kinds of adhesives each year. The company uses leftover stock from previous projects to see what glue works best. “We don’t feel that all products are the same,” Joshua said. “There are a lot of people out there who use PUR, but they’re pretty price-conscious. They’re more driven by the price of the product, not how it performs.”

After thorough testing, deciding which adhesive to use is based on performance, not the company’s bottom line. “It can make a big difference at the end of the year on how much you spend on glue,” David said. “But if you have a job that needs to be reprinted because the glue failed, you’re responsible for that.”

Being educated with the advancement of adhesive technology and products is an important factor. BC Adhesives, Franklin, WI, helps Dillon Bindery in that regard. It specializes in the food processing and general purpose packaging, graphic arts and publishing, paper converting and product assembly and construction markets. BC Adhesives offers a hands-on relationship to its clients. It offers a strong portfolio of the leading adhesive brands, technical expertise and intimate knowledge of the complete range of customer production equipment and product substrates.

“They have an extensive knowledge of the book binding process,” Joshua said. “There are a lot of suppliers out there who sell glue, but they don’t know anything about how it is used or the process. They’ve never even seen the machine that they’re using it for. BC Adhesives puts in a lot of time and they have a lot of knowledge about the binding process. If there’s ever a problem, they are right there to help you out. They are staying on top of the new products that are coming from the different glue companies.” The results of the collaboration are clear. In the five years since Dillon Bindery started running PUR in the open pot application, they haven’t had any spine failures.

Custom Quoting Program Gives Competitive Edge

A computer-based, in-house quoting system that David developed about 12 years ago gives Dillon Bindery greater flexibility when quoting new jobs and analyzing completed jobs. It helps to track costs – start to finish – for each project. When he started building the system, there were other quoting systems on the market, but they were geared more toward printers with in-house binderies, Joshua explained. “Other programs lacked the detail and flexibility required to consider the many variables associated with the binding process,” David said.

Because the software was developed completely in-house, it allows Dillon Bindery to make changes on a regular basis. “Since we are constantly quoting, if there are things that need to be changed or tweaked, we can do it right away,” he said. “We are quoting every day. We see little things here or there. The way we have it set up, when we’re done with a job, we can analyze time sheets and cross reference that with the quoting data. It is very simple in how it is set up. It shows a lot of detail that we can use to analyze the time sheet afterwards.”

The software tracks factors like quantity, stock, material cost, labor cost, machine cost – “everything it takes to put a book together,” David said. It also shows comparisons on different ways of processing a job. “It can tell us which option is the most economical choice.”

A lot of the custom jobs Dillon Bindery works on have small- to medium-size run lengths. “The software will tell us exactly what our costs are for a particular project,” he said. “When we look at the time sheets, we can see exactly how much time was spent on a job as far as machine time, labor hours, etc., and we can go back to the quote to see exactly how the quote compares to the amount of time actually spent doing the job. It allows us to take all the costs of the material added into the final time sheets and gives us an exact analysis of how the job turned out compared to how we quoted it. We can see if adjustments need to be made in our quoting or not.”

The process has allowed Dillon Bindery to stay competitive, while keeping an eye on the bottom line. “Materials, including adhesive, are constantly changing in price,” Joshua said. “The software allows us to analyze that better. It gives us a better understanding of what it costs to do business.”

Humble Beginnings with an Eye on the Future

Dillon Bindery operates out of the same building it did when Karl Dillon founded the company in the 1930s. Its central location within the Milwaukee metropolitan area makes it convenient for local customers. Interstate access is also available for customers from as far away as Green Bay, Steven’s Point, Madison, Chicago and Indiana.

The company leans on its 70 years of book binding, magazine binding and catalog, calendar and brochure graphics arts finishing experience to produce high quality professionally bound publications to serves small, medium and large printers from its 25,000 sq. ft. facility. In addition to PUR and EVA perfect binding, it has a variety of mechanical wire binding, stitching (stapling) and folding capabilities for binding projects where a professionally bound look at a low price point is essential. Equipment at Dillon Bindery includes two Osako saddlestitchers, a Christensen Gang Stitcher, two Kolbus perfect binders, a 30-pocket Duplo booklet maker, five folders, three Durselen automatic drilling machines, two cutters, twin loop and plastic coil binders, along with miscellaneous equipment for eyeletting and elastic tag stringing.

Looking forward, the Schroeckenthalers see continued research and improvements in the PUR binding application and streamlined manufacturing in all processes. “We’ll continue to educate printers regarding the PUR process and the advantages it offers over conventional EVA perfect binding,” Joshua Schroeckenthaler said, noting the company may add inkjet capabilities in the future.

Keeping the business in the family has allowed the Schroeckenthalers to be very hands on with the operation. In addition to father, David, and son, Joshua, there are two other family members on staff. “We all started out in the shop – probably at the bottom moving waste, sweeping the floor,” David Schroeckenthaler said with a chuckle. “It’s been a long time. We’ve all been in the business for a long time now.”

In addition to David and Joshua, family members Anthony Schroeckenthaler and LoRonda Schroeckenthaler also are employed with the bindery as a machine operator and human resources manager/office assistant, respectively. Dillon Bindery also has 20 employees, many of whom have been with the company as long as the second- and third-generation family members. “We have very little turnover,” Joshua said. He attributed that longevity and loyalty with the company’s flexibility and the knowledge that they aren’t just employees. “We make them feel like they are part of the team.”

Coyne Graphic Finishing Mastering the Art of Diversification

November 21, 2012

by Melissa DeDonder, The Binding Edge

According to its customers, Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc. in Mount Vernon, OH, is the “curve ball hitter” in the industry due to its ability to take a project that seems impossible and execute it successfully. Valerie Price, director of business operations, said the company achieves this feat by never shying away from a finishing challenge and by regularly investing in the equipment needed to expand its scope of services. “With the explosion of digital media and fewer commercial printers in existence, companies today must either diversify or perish,” Price said. Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc. has mastered the art of diversification and will go out of its way to complete projects, even on tight deadlines.

Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc.’s story began in 1924. At that time, the company was known as Manufacturing Printers. In 1974, Bob and Alice Coyne purchased the company, changed its scope to commercial printing and, in a few short years, the company became incorporated as Coyne Printing. In 1980, the Coynes purchased a larger facility in Mount Vernon and acquired an additional location in neighboring Heath, OH. The company continued to do business in both locations through the 1980s.

A new era began in 1990, when the Coynes’ son, Kevin, purchased the business and moved all the operations to Mount Vernon. “In 1993, after seeing a need for finishing services in the printing industry, Kevin began shifting the direction of the company to graphic finishing,” Price said. As the company grew, it found itself split between two locations once again, until the late 90’s, when the company transitioned out of the commercial printing business to focus on graphic finishing. Again, the company consolidated both locations, which doubled its production space to its current 60,000 square feet. In 2005, the company rebranded itself and legally changed its name to Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc.

Navigating challenges with gusto

Today, Coyne Graphic Finishing is a one-stop finishing shop. The company offers a wide variety of high-speed, precision-quality services in 23 categories. “We want to do everything from start to finish – from mounting, diecutting and laminating to kit packing and drop shipping. This saves the customer time, money and the headaches that often come from dealing with more than one company,” Price said.

Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc.’s niche is mounting, diecutting and collating large format projects. “We also have turned edge capabilities up to 200pt board, which is unique among turned edge finishers,” Price said. “With our turned edge services, we specialize in carry boards for tile, carpet and any application where samples will be applied. This includes euro binders that fold for high-end siding and housing applications,” Price said.

Currently 60 percent of the company’s business is large format, utilizing processes such as mounting, diecutting, collating, straight knife and laminating. Typical projects in this category include headers, standees, calendars, skirt wraps and point of purchase displays. Turned edge, kit packing and assembly and tinning each represent 10 percent of the company’s business, and the remaining 10 percent comes from high die and ancillary services, such as wire-o, padding, heat bending and CNC routing.

The company primarily serves major metropolitan markets in Ohio and in five neighboring states, as well as in every small town in between. “It has been our practice to knock on every door that may have a project that fits our wheelhouse. From the odd and unusual to the simple diecutting and mounting jobs, we want them all,” Price said. By combining a broad range of capabilities with experienced personnel, Coyne Graphic Finishing can handle even the wildest design and production ideas.

The company recently produced a large volume run of product sample kits that included a material needing artificial “distressing.” To achieve the desired effect, Coyne Graphic Finishing washed the material with coffee grounds to create a stained antique look before placing it inside the kit.

Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc. is willing to take on any challenge, provided that it has the capacity to do so. “We have a ‘we don’t say no’ mentality,” Price said. “Owner Kevin Coyne has an engineering background, so he likes to pursue unusual projects and most of the time, they are outside of the print industry – usually assembly and kit pack projects – or sometimes projects that don’t even have a printed piece in them,” Price said. She said that the company has a project in-house right now that has no printing – it’s a complete shipping, packing and assembly project.

Another recent challenge was a railing project for a national home improvement store. The client had originally designed an in-store display kit with 58 pieces that was to be assembled at each store. “We advised them that the kits were too complicated – they would just get thrown away,” Price said. “We went with them back to the drawing board and together we simplified the project – reducing the kit down to 40 pieces that would be assembled at our facility and then drop shipped to the stores as an ‘unpack and go’ display.” Out of this one project, Coyne Graphic Finishing ended up acquiring four more railing displays.

Despite the unique and sometimes extreme challenges that come with the creative projects, Coyne Graphic Finishing, views them as a win for everyone involved. “For us, they usually provide more of a profit margin than the typical commodity type projects, they present opportunities for us to use our in-house creativity and they involve all of our departments because they have multiple processes involved,” Price said.

The company’s creativity and hard work has paid off. Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc.’s projects have garnered numerous awards and accolades from the Printing Industry of Ohio – N. Kentucky’s Print Excellence Awards competitions, including awards for Best of Show, People’s Choice and Best of Category in 2012 for the USTA Midwest 10 & Under Tennis Display. Additional awards include Best of Show and People’s Choice in 2010 for the Justice Locker Display, and a People’s Choice award for the 2007/2008 Kenworth Calendars.

Empowering the employees

Another secret to Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc.’s success is that the company takes great pride in its 28 employees – their persistence, craftsmanship and commitment to satisfying even the toughest requests. Most of the employees are long-term. “We have employees that have been here since Kevin’s mom and dad owned the company in the mid-70’s,” Price said. “We have a customer service representative who has been here 34 years, and all five of our department leads on the production floor each have more than 15 years with the company.”

Coyne Graphic Finishing trains its employees based on production needs. “We assign employees to learn certain machines from start to finish based on their interest in learning. After a few months, we switch them to another machine so that no one person has all the knowledge,” Price said. The company also brings in outside technicians to teach employees how to manage, care for and efficiently operate difficult equipment.

A recent restructuring initiative put the focus on employee empowerment, a need that was based on several jobs that had been completed, but were flawed. “It’s a very expensive lesson to learn when we need to have something reprinted and refinished, especially at the end of the project and at our expense,” Price said. So, the company focused on the need to empower its employees to make decisions on the floor – at the production line – if something needs to be stopped or reworked before the job is complete.

Coyne Graphic Finishing, Inc.’s department leads and customer service representatives know what projects are coming in and when they are scheduled, either from the time of the purchase order or – if it’s a large job – from the time of the quote. This team will follow a project from start to finish, which includes the final banding, wrapping and labeling for shipment. “They work together to streamline processes and address any issues before the job even arrives on the production floor,” Price said.

“We’ve found that this is an essential step in the process. We’ve put a lot of stop gaps and autonomy in place, and there’s a lot of cooperativeness in the process,” Price said. “Our employees are able to make the right choices on the fly and, as a result, we have become more efficient, cut production costs and increased the quality of the product that we offer,” Price said.

Looking into the crystal ball

When asked about industry trends and how the company is responding, Price had this to say: “Our customer base is shrinking every year. With fewer commercial printers, more printing companies are becoming the competition by buying their own equipment and ‘finishing’ the projects in-house to keep themselves employed, rather than sending the work out to the true finishing specialists.”

Despite these trends, Price emphasizes that Coyne Graphic Finishing will continue to partner with companies that compliment the company’s capabilities. “We are willing to share a project with our partners who are more specialized in a particular area than we are. I think a lot of businesses are afraid to do so – they are afraid of losing a customer, but we really don’t have that fear. If our customer wants to leave us, it’s because we did something wrong,” Price said.

The company has seen more customers who are looking for the best price and turn times. “Where there used to be customer loyalty, few companies can afford that luxury now,” Price said. She added that Coyne Graphic Finishing is constantly looking for that next opportunity to diversify, and sometimes that means looking outside of their traditional market. “Many of our specialty projects are brokered jobs or they originate from a marketing company. This is one of the ways that we’re trying to diversify so that we’re not completely dependent on the print industry,” Price said.

The company’s long term goals are to continue to grow, at a steady pace, by listening to the customer’s needs and by investing in new equipment to keep up with the growing demand for specialty services in the industry. “We’re constantly searching for the next ‘explosion’ that will hit the marketplace in terms of new equipment, services and out-of-the-box thinking. We will continue to make alliances with others in the industry from printing to finishing, offering more services to our clients and making more business available for our partners and ourselves,” Price concluded.