My thoughts is that our industry seems to be dealing with everything at once... (the latest) recession, internet, craiglist, and aging business models. As a vendor to the industry we have been forced to become more efficient with our inventory and overhead. We have discontinued products, heavily invested (investing) in the creation of new products to help our customers become more efficient and profitable, crosstrained our techs to handle both equipment and service, reduced personel, and try to save where we can in expenses. Last month four of my friends/clients closed their doors due to consolidation and are out of jobs. From a vendor/salesperson viewpoint I find myself investing more time researching ideas and solutions for clients.
In the midst of the chaos we all need to embrace change and focus on staying positive while we carve a new path in our industry. I have been reading this book called "Thinker Toys" by Michael Michalko, it's a book teaching creative thinking techniqes to look for answers/solutions in different ways. There are hundreds of years of experience and people in all facets of our industry participating on this board we all have different roles and levels of experience to give. I'd love to see a folder on print planet called 'Idea Exchange' with subfolders where we can post specific challenges and together we can brainstorm solutions/ideas.
Kindest regards,
Michelle