Quick-Printers See Technology Shaping Future

Thumbing through the telephone directory in search of a printing company can be a daunting experience.

In the Orange County Central book alone, there are 17 pages of printers. By most accounts, there will be more next year.

But that may be the last time the directory swells appreciably with listings for quick-service printing firms. Industry observers say the market is approaching saturation and that it is time for the rapid expansion to peak.

To avoid being lost in the crowd, quick-printers now are embarking on a technological spree that promises to revolutionize the business.

By most accounts, the industry began taking off in the early 1970s, and there now are three leaders in the race to be biggest in the business.

In third place is Sir Speedy. The Laguna Hills-based franchiser, born in 1968 in Newport Beach, now has about 670 stores around the nation.

In first place is Los Angeles-based Postal Instant Press, which has about 1,100 stores. Kwik Kopy, headquartered in Houston, has about 1,000 stores.

And despite predictions by the industry trade group and by many independents that the American quick-printing market is near saturation, Sir Speedy and other large chains believe that there is still room for the $3.5-billion industry to grow, domestically and overseas.

“We think there is substantial room for expansion,” said William Seidel, chief financial officer of Postal Instant Press.

Sir Speedy officials say Western Europe, Canada and Hong Kong offer “very attractive” opportunities for expansion. In addition, the company is exploring prospects in South America, Japan, the Middle East and Africa.

In the domestic arena, Sir Speedy and the other major chains say normal business expansion will continue to create a market for their services and will enable them to increase the number of franchises they sell each year.

Each time a new franchise is sold, a worker in Sir Speedy’s franchising department rings a large school bell that can be heard through the building. So far this year, the piercing clang of the bell has been heard 70 times, and Sir Speedy executives say they hope to hear it at least 30 times more--and possibly 50 times--by the end of the year.

Expect Expansion

And barring an economic slump, company officials say they expect to continue such an expansion pace next year.

But the industry’s trade group thinks Sir Speedy and PIP might be overly optimistic.

Brian Tugliese, a spokesman for the Chicago-based National Assn. of Quick Printers, said that the industry has undergone a “very big growth spurt in the last three years” and that the domestic saturation point is near.

According to figures compiled by the NAQP, there are about 20,000 quick-print shops in the United States. About 28% of them are franchise owned; the remainder are independents. NAQP predicts that mix will remain about the same in coming years.

The industry has expanded so rapidly in recent years that Quick Printing magazine, a trade journal based in Fort Pierce, Fla., has “had to drastically revise our numbers upward several times,” said Rob Schweiger, publisher. Schweiger figures there are about 24,000 quick-printers in the United States, about 20% of which are franchises.

But whether an independent or a franchisee, quick-printer shops typically are small operations. Getting into the business is more like purchasing a job than launching an entrepreneurial venture.

Buying such a job with a chain costs from $75,000 to $125,000--a price that includes training and all the equipment necessary to open the doors for business. The franchisee is responsible for securing a location.

Costs can be higher, or lower, for independents, who operate without the advertising and equipment backup a franchisee gets.

Typical of Independents

Rudy Crews is typical of the independents who entered the industry during the last decade.

Crew’s 2-year-old shop, Western Printing, Artistry and Graphics, now has seven employees and is turning a profit, but Crews recalls the first year and a half “were a real struggle.” Competitors are more plentiful than burger stands, and Crews reckons there are 20 other print shops within a mile radius of his shop in Orange.

“It’s a competitive market, there is no doubt about it,” said Tony Freeman, part owner of Mr. Zips, a Santa Ana quick-printer. But Freeman, like others in the industry, is riding the 1980s American business boom. Particularly in areas of vigorous expansion like Orange County, new and existing businesses “all need those basic operating tools,” invoices, letterhead stationery and various forms, Freeman explained.

The quick-print industry was born in the mid-1960s when Rochester, N.Y.-based Itek Inc. developed a procedure that allowed printing plates to be made without going through the arduous process of making a negative first.

Getting a small printing job done before the development of the Itek camera was like using a Boeing 747 to carry five passengers--possible but not practical.

Until that marriage of technology and demand spawned the quick-print industry, getting even a small printing job required a complicated platemaking process that was as expensive as it was time-consuming. Customers “paid more, and they waited,” said Don Lowe, president and chief executive of Sir Speedy.

Today, commercial printers are busier than ever, churning out magazines and multicolor brochures that quick-printers often don’t have the capability to produce. But the quick-printing industry filled a demand for production of relatively small quantities of flyers, resumes, menus, business cards, price lists and other printed material that commercial shops were not equipped to produce economically.

More Paper Than Ever

Although some expected the electronic age to result in a “paperless office,” businesses so far are generating more paper than ever--with no abatement in sight--experts and industry officials say. According to the NAQP, the industry trade group, quick-printing has grown by about 35% since 1983.

“This is the information age,” said one print company executive. “Invoices, forms, price lists, advertising material, these things are very difficult to convert to computers.”

Instead computers are increasingly being used by the quick-printing industry to produce paper work.

“The quality is coming up,” said Rich Holland, a spokesman for Sir Speedy. About 75 Sir Speedy shops have equipment that enables them to set type electronically, he said.

“Desk-top publishing is going to be big time in the 1990s,” said Kenny Fisher, owner of Kenny the Printer in Irvine, apparently the nation’s largest single-site quick-printing shop, according to the NAQP.

Advances in electronic publishing have been “absolutely astronomical,” he said, and desk-top publishing is “moving like lightning. Six-months-old equipment is outdated.”

Such advances will create opportunities for renewed growth in the industry, many believe.

Increasingly, the quick-print industry is becoming a multicolor enterprise, and advancing technology promises to bring down the cost of full-color printing.

And the new technologies are fragmenting the 20-year-old quick-print industry, and two new industries are emerging--quick copying and desk-top publishing.

The development of high-speed copiers in recent years has prompted the development of shops that deal exclusively with making photocopies.

Next Wave of Change

And while the quality of electronically produced printed material still cannot match typeset copy, desk-top publishing looms as the next wave of change for the printing industry. Desk-top publishing employs a word processor coupled with a laser printer, enabling the operator to immediately print the pages created on the computer. The finished pages are then reproduced on a press or a high-speed copier.

Again, it was a steep drop in the price of the equipment that opened up the new industries