The Rewards of Collecting Community ‘Vig’
If you have watched as many movies and TV series as I have since March of last year, ‘vig’ may be a term you are familiar with. Vig … is slang for vigorish. Vig is the juice, the squeeze, the charge that a businessperson gets for helping broker a transaction or attached as interest on […]
How a Packaging Nerd Sees Increases in eCommerce During the Pandemic
As a packaging engineering geek, I constantly look at the packaging that ships to my home. Ecommerce shipments experienced an explosion increasing 75%-80% in the first half of 2020 versus 2019. For those who decide to forgo the in-store experience, skip BOPIS (buying online, picking up in-store) and opt-out of curbside pickup, the next best […]
Say YES to Customer Lists from Colleagues Who Are Closing Their Doors
When the magazine I ran for 22 years closed its doors, the owners offered me all the business data and customer lists for free. They were not going to do anything with it, and everything would be purged by the end of the tax year. So I said yes. Saying yes not only gave me […]
2021 CMYK MANIFESTO: REFLECT, RELEASE, RECOVER and REBOUND
Greetings Citizens of the Printerverse and welcome to a New Year! It is a new year, right? The calendar has changed but, in many ways, it feels like 2020 is still lingering. This annual post has traditionally focused on what is in front of us, but honestly, there is still a lot of uncertainty to […]
Print Samples! Let’s Get Started!
Over the decades I’ve developed a love affair with print samples. It started back in high school when I worked in a print shop that had been in business since the 1700s. We ran a web press in house, though the newspapers were done over at Princeton Packet. Promotional printing and inserts were done in-house […]
Hybrid Marketing Teams Are Here and They’re Hot
Marketing departments in printing businesses are being disrupted. Today’s employees have been adjusting and adapting on the fly. Many have been deployed elsewhere during the pandemic. Most marketing people I talk to are carrying multiple roles within the company. They’re covering for other employees who need flexible time off, or they’re pivoting to address urgent […]
Setting Communication Goals for 2021 and Beyond
The year that seemed it would never end, and that most people said was the worst they have ever experienced, is ending. Let’s take a moment to sit with that. Let it wash over you. It’s almost over. And now, it is time to start making plans for 2021 and beyond. Don’t hate me for […]