What’s in the Stars for Print?:
When Frank Romano speaks, I always listen. Recently he was the star of a webinar sponsored by At Techkon, Frank Romano shared his print industry predictions.
“Printing does have a future,” Frank opined.
1. What can printers do to stay competitive?
2. Where do you see the industry in 2023?
3. What’s the outlook for offset vs. digital?
4. What’s your take on the paperless debate?
Frank: It’s not a debate. You’re not going to stop the forces of electronic communications. Wang said offices would be paperless in the early 1970s. Offices today are Wangless, not paperless. It’s foolhardy to fight the paperless sayers. We have to find a way to get paper into the mix. We should help printers understand where new markets are. But some markets are going away – Variety just announced its print edition is going to weekly, not daily.
The print industry should be fighting the postal service instead! We have some serious problems out there, starting with this one.
We need to help printers find new markets. The future is going to be in new markets on lots of substrates.
5. Where would you look to find new markets?
Frank: I’d buy a wide-format inkjet printer. Printing on paper has become a commodity. Another market that’s evolving is printing on fabric. If you can print on tons of substrates, you can still print on paper.
He also touched on packaging. “The packaging market can only be a growth market. It will always be an analog market."
