From the Editor: Salt Lake Sojourn
There are a couple of cities around the country with strong in-plant communities, where the managers all know one another and get together from time to time. Last month I had the privilege of visiting one of those places, Salt Lake City, and attending two meetings hosted by in-plants.
IPG Editor Bob Neubauer entertains managers during lunch at Intermountain Healthcare.
I arrived on a warm autumn day and drove immediately from the airport to the Intermountain Healthcare Supply Chain Center, about 15 minutes south of downtown, where the company’s Design & Print Center was hosting an In-plant Printing and Mailing Association (IPMA) chapter meeting. I met with managers from several local in-plants, including Brigham Young University, the University of Utah, the Church of Jesus Christ of LDS, DMBA and others.
After lunch, I gave a short talk on how the in-plant industry has changed over the years, since I started as editor of IPG in 1994. (For one thing, it’s harder than ever to get non-university in-plants to agree to be profiled in the magazine due to internal restrictions; many won’t even provide any information for our list of the largest in-plants, on page 22 of this issue.)
Tour of Intermountain's in-plant.
Then we were given a tour of Intermountain’s impressive fulfillment center, one of the top health care supply chains in the country, as well as its Design and Print Center, powered by Ricoh and Kodak digital printers.
The in-plant was created only a few years ago, when Operations Manager Tami Reese was tasked with consolidating the company’s scattered print operations into a central location. Despite being given a 10-year ROI period, the in-plant accomplished this in just three and a half years. The operation prints items such as hospital statements, open enrollment materials, provider directories, explanation of benefits statements, business cards, envelopes, brochures and posters.
In DMBA's in-plant.
The next day I walked from my hotel to DMBA’s headquarters, not far from Temple Square, to attend IPMA’s second Road Show event, a series of mini conferences the association is organizing around the country. The first took place the week before in Columbia, Mo., hosted by Shelter Insurance.
In-plant managers convened again at DMBA's headquarters for the IPMA Road Show event.
Some of the same managers from the day before were there. After lunch and some presentations by Canon Solutions America, we toured DMBA’s Central Services operation, where a brand new Ricoh Pro C7100x digital color printer has joined the shop’s HP Indigo 7000. The Ricoh was added specifically to print the company’s ID cards, a job that was previously outsourced.
It was nice to finally see this operation that I’ve written about several times and meet the staff members I didn’t already know from IPMA conferences. Likewise, touring Intermountain Healthcare’s in-plant gave me some great background for my planned article on this successful operation in a coming issue of IPG.
Bob has served as editor of In-plant Impressions since October of 1994. Prior to that he served for three years as managing editor of Printing Impressions, a commercial printing publication. Mr. Neubauer is very active in the U.S. in-plant industry. He attends all the major in-plant conferences and has visited more than 170 in-plant operations around the world. He has given presentations to numerous in-plant groups in the U.S., Canada and Australia, including the Association of College and University Printers and the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association. He also coordinates the annual In-Print contest, co-sponsored by IPMA and In-plant Impressions.
