Salary Range differences Pressroom & Prep

[PatrickMcd]

It is obvious that people have different skill levels in this trade, and should be paid accordingly. We have a wide range of presses & skill level at this shop. Small 11" 2/color webs to 18" 6/color webs- envelope presses to 29" 5/color sheetfed machines. Compared to the salarys out in the pressroom, where is a "can do it all" prepress tech in relation with these other guys? Should he be in range with the top pressman or the smaller machine guys? We have also introduced wide format and he is handling all that stuff too.

 

[Joe Duffy]

A "Do All" prepress person saves you tons of money each year in what they bring to the table. If the errors are low, they are dependable and reliable, I paid mine as much as the top pressman in my shop.

 

[PatrickMcd]

Thank You Joe. I agree.

 

[SlaveToTheMan]

Funny, we were just having this discussion a few days ago but we're actually in the Prep Dept so it may be a little biased. Of course we took the same point of view, that valuable prepress people should be receiving compensation based on their proven value to the company, particularly when it comes to "doing it all" instead of just coasting. I have to wonder how many places have a review system in place to gauge the skills of their prep people though.

Part of our discussion boiled down to the fact that, although press operators are still a very skilled position, a good many of the functions they used to be responsible for are now taken care of in prep. When was the last time an operator on a modern press had to set ink keys manually? It's all generated by the plating software. Hanging plates? They're already punched by the plate setter, they just stick 'em in the plate bender & the press hangs 'em lickity split. Ink control? Got a system that does that too, just replace a can when the light starts blinking. Of course I'm over-simplifying it and they still have to manage paper feeding, unloading and tweaking color through a run along with general QC and any number of other things I'd never even have the first idea about. It just seems that while a larger portion of the responsibility for a job's success has transferred to the front of shop, the wages never followed.

At least it appears that way in this shop, maybe we're not the "norm" however.

 

[Joe Duffy]

Not all shops are that automated at press, we have a combination of automatic setting and everything manual so skill is still involved. If you think not, let a prepress guy go be a flyer on a press for a day to understand just what happens at a press.

Here is a quick way to prove a good prepress operators worth... give him a week off. How much work gets out, is it right, is it on-time. If the prepress "do all" operator does not have his cell phone with him, he will be both loved and hated when he returns!

 

[PatrickMcd]

Here is a quick way to prove a good prepress operators worth... give him a week off. How much work gets out, is it right, is it on-time. If the prepress "do all" operator does not have his cell phone with him, he will be both loved and hated when he returns![/QUOTE]



Ha! So give him a raise & a week off! Sounds like the good ole' days!

 

[rich apollo]

Ha! So give him a raise & a week off! Sounds like the good ole' days!

Give 'em a what and a what ?!

 

[zoran]

I am from Prepress area so I am biased too, but the same thing goes for Prepress.
All the automation and software makes Prepress job 10 times easier than it used to be.
It used to be manually stripping pieces of film to create chokes and spreads, than it moved to software.
I remember having couple of defaults for trapping than digging in with trapping tool to manually trap most if not all traps with software.
Now these days 99% of the jobs just go through without operator even thinking about trapping them (automatic trapping by software in PDF), that is how systems evolved.

I also remember spending tons of time dropping large impo proofs, now it's seconds/minutes to do on booklet proofer.

I remember manually mixing powders, sometimes for hours so I can do proper chromaline proof, it evolved to minutes sending PDF to Epson.

Don't get me wrong, I like where we are now, speed and efficiency in Prepress multiplied with all the software and hardware automation and upgrades.
What is the next step, no prepress?
At least that is what it looks like to me, if you have good MIS, good automated PDF workflow with all the other automated devices, all you need is client skills upgrades

 

[Joe Duffy]

"I remember manually mixing powders, sometimes for hours so I can do proper chromaline proof, it evolved to minutes sending PDF to Epson."

You forgot to add how wonderful the rainbow was when you blew your nose afterwards....


"What is the next step, no prepress?
At least that is what it looks like to me, if you have good MIS, good automated PDF workflow with all the other automated devices, all you need is client skills upgrades."

Sounds good, but been trying for 23 years to do this and have had very little sucess. Most are unwilling to do anything else because they all believe there is a magic button in prepress to make everything ok. Software is great, but the skill of the operator is what makes everything work in a timely, and hopefully profitable manner.

 

[SlaveToTheMan]

"What is the next step, no prepress?"

That'll happen by attrition. Don't see a lot of skilled bodies coming into prepress these days. Hell, I'm the youngest guy in our 6-person dept and I'm no spring chicken!

 

[swcook6]

If you work in the pressroom or prepress and you still have any pay at all you should be thankful. That being said, with all the automation there are still technical challenges that are easily overlooked and many times under appreciated by managers. This may be because it "looks" easy (just a person sitting at the desk in front of the computer). A skilled prepress operator can often fix things very quickly that without that skill, the job would be held up, (maybe sent back to the client for fixes) or sent through and the errors caught later or maybe not caught until the piece is printed. Worse yet not caught until the client sees it. Sometimes I sit and wonder how many thousands of dollars a skilled operator actually saves their company in reduced errors and efficiency annually that no one even realizes.

 

[SlaveToTheMan]

If you work in the pressroom or prepress and you still have any pay at all you should be thankful.

I think that's exactly how the Employers see it, and their justification for the continued cuts in salary, benefits, hours, etc. "Hey, be glad you even have a paycheck!" I have a suspicion that this is just the "new way" of doing business & employers believe they have the upper hand in an economy where jobs are so few & far between. It really doesn't engender any loyalty or even motivation in the employees to go that extra mile (or inch) and I think once/if the economy bounces back, that there will be a large egress of skilled people who feel shafted by the companies they stood by during the down times.

Or not, who really knows.

 

[swcook6]

I think you are absolutely correct in your analogy.

 

[ondemandbindery]

As much as it burns me up at times, I still say the pressman earns the maximum wage based on one thing. Everything that revolves around the press can get farmed out and done. But the press is what makes a Printing company. And I am a Bindery guy. All aspects of the business are important but no press no profit. On the Printing side of the business anyway.