A new model for the printing industry
By Nancy Hitchcock
When printing companies want to strengthen their positions in the marketplace, they often develop unions in the form of mergers, partnerships, or strategic alliances. Or, they might add new services such as digital printing or marketing solutions. A strategic union recently transpired, however, when a marketing solutions company acquired a print provider to add printing capabilities to its array of marketing services.

That happened a year ago when an ambitious start-up marketing company — The Marketing Dept., Inc. — decided it needed a printer to anchor its business operations. At the same time, Squamscott Press, a small printer that’s been in existence since the late 1940s, was ready to infuse the company with new energy.

Peter Bagley founded The Marketing Dept. in 2005 and, after a year of research, decided to acquire Squamscott Press, Inc in March 2007. Now, The Marketing Dept. offers customers a one-stop shop for marketing services that include producing Web sites, e-mails, direct mail, ads, and printed collateral. And Squamscott Press continues to serve its customers with high-quality print, yet also offers them a comprehensive marketing solution packages.

In the last year, The Marketing Dept. has grown the print company by offering full-service marketing solutions to about 35 of its customers.

“We grew the printing side 11 percent,” says Bagley. “The company grew revenue wise 18 percent.”

“I see it as a win-win,” said Melvin Wilt, who has presided over the print company for 17 years, “because customers will continue to get the service that they are used to getting because the print side of the business is not being abandoned, but we’re now able to offer our clients additional marketing services such as e-commerce and web design that we were never into before. Squamscott Press, even though it’s a very established name and company, has got new life and new products and services to offer to it’s customers.”

Building a solid reputation
Melvin C. Wilt proudly describes his 17-year journey at Squamscott Press and how he grew the company from $150,000 in annual sales in 1990 when he bought it to a $1.5 million company when he sold it in 2007. Previously, Wilt had worked in the print industry for 28 years for large print shops such as Dartmouth Printing and Bradford & Bigelow. After climbing the corporate ladder, Wilt decided to buy his own small shop. When Wilt bought Squamscott, it already had a large customer base of small businesses and key academic clients such as Phillips Exeter Academy.

Through perseverance and hard work, Squamscott Press grew from two employees to 17.

In fact, Squamscott Press grew strictly through a reputation of great service and attention to detail. Squamscott Press hired Michele Cloutier as the first sales person about four years ago.

“Mel built this company on integrity, quality, and standing behind the product,” Cloutier said. “He built an excellent reputation. The bottom line is we want the
customer to be serviced. It’s all about integrity — do what you say you’re going to when you say you’re going to do it. Sometimes there are things beyond your control, but we communicate it to the client. We try and keep communication open internally as well. We do what we have to do to make every customer happy.”

In the last five years as the industry became increasingly competitive, Wilt felt the pressure of investing in new technologies and keeping up with changes in the industry.

“One thing you learn is that you don’t always need to be on the cutting edge of technology,” says Wilt. “There is always a concern that you may not be able to serve the needs of your clients, but you need to calculate when to install a new technology. If you’re getting good feedback from your customers and listening to what they’re asking for, you know when it’s time.

“When we first looked at Computer to Plate Technology (CTP), the cost was more than $200,000 and it came down 40 percent over time,” he adds. “We were able to get a good system at a great price. So you just have to time it right.”

Squamscott Press installed a Kodak Magnus CTP system to service its four presses: a four-color four-up Sakurai, a two-color Komori perfector, a two-color Ryobi, and a small Hamada press. The pressroom also operates finishing equipment including a cutter, folder, collator/ booklet maker and shrink-wrap equipment.

The CTP system streamlined the workflow by simplifying operations and reducing makereadies.

“From a production standpoint, we have no more chemicals, so it’s a much cleaner process, and we have quicker make readies,” says Wilt. “We think it’s great. The investment has been worth every penny. We’re a mid market printer, so we have to be smart about what we do and how we invest our money. We chose to invest in CTP technology vs. digital presses because of the wide varied market that we service. In some cases, digital printing, which is a four-color process, won’t produce particular colors that we need, such as PMS colors.”

The company produces print jobs ranging from 250 business cards and letterhead to 140,000 brochures with typical jobs comprising about 20,000 pocket folders or tri-fold brochures. Operating one shift, the mid market printer services a broad base of clients including large corporate, academia, health companies, and designers.

By staying focused on providing customers with quality craftsmanship, Squamscott Press grew its customer base and stayed in business through the challenges faced by the industry.

“I’ve been in this industry 45 plus years and to have seen it back in the 50s when I was introduced to printing to where it is today, it’s an amazing journey. That’s what I’m most proud of — 17 years later we’re still growing. We just kept focused and we stayed humble. We knew where we came from.”

Squamscott Press has built a very solid reputation in the marketplace. Now Pete will merge Squamscott Press with The Marketing Dept. and introduce a modern day use of technology. “Marketing and using technology such as e-commerce is an area that Pete is very strong in,” says Wilt. “I see the advantage of The Marketing Dept and bringing a whole new energy and a new approach to the market. I think that will help sustain Squamscott Press and its presence in the industry. It should make a solid future for everybody.”

The wide range of marketing, electronic based and printing requirements generates the need for a sales and customer service staff to have the knowledge and adaptability to adjust and research to find the best solution to the project. Every project is custom built which requires the need to provide the client with a satisfactory solution of what they are trying to sell or how to supply the information. It is part of the function of the sales and customer service staff to make all those ideas and concepts come together, so that the customer receive the best results possible.

Professionalism, consistency and first impressions are the key results our customers expect from us to make things work for their businesses.

Bagley brings more than 25 years of experience in sales, service and marketing management in positions within both start-up companies and Fortune 500 corporations. He actually started in the printing industry with Xerox Corporation and migrated to the high technology industry. Over the course of 20 years, Bagley has worked with hundreds of businesses ranging from small home businesses to large companies such as Raytheon and IBM Global Services. Bagley has also taught marketing courses at Bentley College in Waltham, Mass., as an adjunct professor. “The combination of my business marketing experience and my academic work at Bentley College provided the foundation for the company’s business model,” he said.

Generating new business
The Marketing Dept.’s mission is to generate more business revenues for small companies by customizing marketing solutions that fit the customers’ objective and budgets. Marketing solutions include: Web sites, newspaper ads, e-mail marketing, direct mail, and sales materials. After a year of research and launching his business, Bagley zeroed in on purchasing a printer with a large small business customer base.

“Over 40 to 50 percent of all marketing materials and activities fundamentally involve print — brochures, sales flyers, and expo and trade show materials,” explains Bagley. “Our strategy was to buy a mid-market printing company that could do all that, plus had a customer base that we could cross sell our marketing services to.”

Since The Marketing Dept. purchased Squamscott Press in March 2007, it has worked with clients of the printing company and expanded their services.

“We’re working with about 35 customers right now — some home businesses, most small businesses, a few $5 million companies, and a $75 million high-tech company,” says Bagley. “We were doing $80,000 to $100,000 in printing with one customer, and now we’re doing their Web site and e-mail marketing as well.

“Within a 40-mile radius, The Marketing Dept. has a base of 1,200 customers of whom 600 to 700 are active every year,” he continues. “From a print point of view, they might only need business cards printed every three years, but from a marketing point of view, every month or calendar quarter we can do some marketing for them to grow their business.”

It’s time-consuming and costly for small companies to do all the marketing for themselves, says Bagley, therefore he proposes to save them money and grow their revenue. “We don’t take a printing point of view in our business,” says Bagley. “We take a ‘what is the best marketing solution for the customer to grow their business’ view. That might include; e-mail marketing campaigns with brochures, direct mail, or many other combinations that we put together for the customer.”

Saving customers time and money
One customer, for example, Trident Environmental, is saving money and making money by having The Marketing Dept. manage all of its marketing activities.

“Trident had five companies doing marketing work for them — a printer for stationery, a designer for logo work, a mail house for direct mail, a cousin that did their Web site, and occasionally Staples for sales sheets. Our proposed solution is that we fully integrate everything they need into one process so the materials look the same and work together to provide more market awareness. Our objective is to become the marketing department for our customers. We do all their direct mail, their Christmas cards, their hats with logos — we do everything. We’re a one-stop shop for marketing services.

“They went from five providers of marketing services to one, us,” Bagley continues. “The client saved about $5,000 in annual expenses, they have full control over their marketing now, and their brand image is consistent. Every month we provide something for Trident Environmental — direct mail, direct e-mail, trade show, and hats.”

The Marketing Dept. has a plan to grow the company by 50 percent in 2008 to be about a $3 million company. With more than 35 marketing customers already, it hopes to gain 100 more by the end of the year.

“We are doing a little more than $100,000 in e-mail marketing for clients a year and that’s growing,” reports Bagley. “Every month we add two or three new clients for marketing services from the printing customer base alone. We’ll have 100 more new customers by the end of this year.”

With The Marketing Dept.’s acquisition of Squamscott Press, it forms a great new model for printers with a strengthened mission: to provide customers with marketing solutions that bolster their businesses. And the customized marketing solutions range from high-end technology services to high-quality print.

The combined strengths of the Marketing Department and Squamscott Press position the company to fulfill the needs and adjust to the challenges in this changing industry. Established and new clients will be see significant increase in qualified leads and name recognition in the market place whether that market place requires marketing communications, signage, electronic information and advertising or printed materials. This combined force will be able to cover it all.

About the author: Nancy A. Hitchcock writes about the printing and graphic arts industries. She can be reached at .