Print Shop Departments and who goes where?

[jdodoubleg]

Currently, most of our departments are under one roof.

We have just signed a lease for a new production warehouse that will house our production, bindery, and shipping departments. Our sales, design, administration, and prepress employees will all be housed back at the old building.

I am pushing to have our prepress department come to the new building, as I think prepress should be under the production umbrella. Am I wrong?

Other than the fact that I think it would be easier for production/bindery to interact with prepress in person, what other reasons can I point to? I need help to make this point come across in a meaningful way. I appreciate any help with this.

 

[SoggyWinter]

Having prepress housed with production makes it easier for production to bring forward issues with file setup, and for pre-press to get hands on with their output to better understand what they're setting up.

 

[Mike the Print Man]

Not having prepress in the same building as your production staff would be a nightmare. I can count at least a dozen times a day when a press operator comes into the prepress department to ask a question, or bindery needs clarification on how to fold a unique job. Sales and admin could certainly go in another building, because if prepress has a question usually a simple phone call will clear anything up.

 

[SheetSqueezer]

Something that hasn’t been mentioned in this discussion is what kind of ‘production’ do you have? Do you have any offset presses that need plates carried over from prepress? How big are these presses/plates? Or are you a digital only shop, whereas no plates need to be carried to the pressroom?

 

[jdodoubleg]

We do not have any offset presses.

We have the following:

2 - HP R2000
1 - SwissQ Nyala
1 - Durst P5
4 - Epson 64" surecolor series printers
1 - Ricoh 9500
1 - Ricoh 7210x
4 - Colex Sharpcut
1 - Kongsberg C64
2 - Zund D3
1 - Rollem Insignia 6H

Prepress has a hand in the setups of almost everysingle file that runs through every single one of these machines.

 

[PricelineNegotiator]

Yes they need to be located in your print building. Sounds like upper management couldn't justify a building that could house everyone, but don't let them tank production efficiencies by half-assing where people should be.

Hell, everyone should be in the same building.

 

[jdodoubleg]

Yes they need to be located in your print building. Sounds like upper management couldn't justify a building that could house everyone, but don't let them tank production efficiencies by half-assing where people should be.

Hell, everyone should be in the same building.

It would be nice if we were all in the same building - this new building will bring together 3 others - so we are making progress.

 

[YourCastle]

does your prepress also do design?

If so, you're in a bind as sales and customers want to interface directly with designers.

If your prepress also designs and produces, you could sell the sales the team with, "I know you'd like direct access to the designers, but when a client comes to visit, you could take the opportunity to drive them over to the new facility and show off how awesome it is and how the company is dedicated to producing the best materials today and well into the future."

for upper management... "it'll be more cost-effective if the sales people do NOT have immediate and easy access as they'll be forced to be more efficient interacting with the design/prepress team. Right now, they pop into prepress whenever they want. Studies show that it takes a person 10-20 minute to get back to 100% efficiency after an interruption. By requiring sales to drive over, they have to visit with all their questions ready to go or they'll wind up wasting their own time. This will improve efficiency for everyone in the company."

I think your obstacle isn't upper management, but the sales team.

 

[jdodoubleg]

does your prepress also do design?

If so, you're in a bind as sales and customers want to interface directly with designers.

If your prepress also designs and produces, you could sell the sales the team with, "I know you'd like direct access to the designers, but when a client comes to visit, you could take the opportunity to drive them over to the new facility and show off how awesome it is and how the company is dedicated to producing the best materials today and well into the future."

for upper management... "it'll be more cost-effective if the sales people do NOT have immediate and easy access as they'll be forced to be more efficient interacting with the design/prepress team. Right now, they pop into prepress whenever they want. Studies show that it takes a person 10-20 minute to get back to 100% efficiency after an interruption. By requiring sales to drive over, they have to visit with all their questions ready to go or they'll wind up wasting their own time. This will improve efficiency for everyone in the company."

I think your obstacle isn't upper management, but the sales team.

No our prepress does not do design. We have a separate design department. I like your thoughts about sales though.