| |
|
|
Firms that specialize in prepress services are alive, kicking and succeeding,
despite major restructuring in the market. It is no secret that seismic shifts are
reverberating forward and backward in
the graphic arts supply chain. The
dramatic reduction in demand for high-end scanning,
page composition and film imaging has rocked the
market, winnowing away many firms that had specialized in premedia services. As customers have taken a
greater role in generating production files, leading print
firms have added prepress services to more efficiently
drive their own production and to troubleshoot or generally offer more services to customers.
According to the U.S. Dept. of Commerce Economic
Census issued last year, the number of prepress companies dropped 36% from 3,191 in 1997 to 2,030 in
2002. Firms either shut down or were acquired.
Those left which still specialize in prepress or premedia services have evolved into a new breed, expanding
services to include offset printing, digital printing, digital
asset management, electronic mechanicals, software
services, digital photography, design, database services,
soft proofing, print management services and more.
Firms participating in Graphic Arts Monthly’s 2006
Top Prepress/Premedia ranking report, both stand-alone shops and printers that offer prepress, acknowledge that the prepress business is still ripe with opportunities, but the model for success has changed.
Graphic Systems Group (GSG), New
York City, hired a branding specialist to redefine itself and its markets. It now describes
itself is a production agency and acts as an
extension to its Fortune 500 clients.
Ken Madsen, partner/owner of the company, says huge opportunities were created
when the ad agency world opted to shed
production operations and focus on its core
competency: creative.
Founded as a high-end retoucher in 1983,
GSG offers a smorgasbord of complete turn-key services: graphic design, retouching,
digital photography, digital imaging, digital
mechanicals and output, photolab services,
large-format output, digital asset management
and B2B workflow solutions.
As the print control arm for Major League
Baseball, it makes sure all print produced
for the organization and its teams adhere to
set standards. The company selects the prepress and printing firms to produce work for
teams and events in other locations, and produces the work for local teams and events.
Consumer product and cosmetic companies turn to GSG for such services as product
color control, comps in up to 17 colors, high-end retouching and FDA references. Digital
print products are produced on EFI VUTEk
devices and short-run digital printing on Xerox
DocuColor 8000 devices.
The company offers database services that
organize client’s data to produce effective one-to-one marketing pieces. It has also designed
more than 40 different client websites for
managing digital assets, which has reduced
customer design time from four months to
three weeks, says Madsen.
Below, GAM lists top prepress firms, by
sales revenue. Data was provided by the companies or estimated by multiplying employee count by IPA’s 2005 Economic Study of average sales per employee ($146,836). Giants
RR Donnelley, Quebecor World and Banta
opted not to break out premedia services.
|
|
