Briefing
Printers must learn to go with Flow
Earlier this month Amazon launched an app update that has been described as a major threat to traditional retailers. However, not everyone is running scared as the opportunities may be significant.
Competition row sparks wider examination of indent sales
A row between Paperlinx and Sappi intensified last month when Sappi claimed a complaint lodged against it by the paper merchant for unfair competition had been dismissed.
Partnerships remain popular in 2014
All the rage last year, strategic partnerships between vendors continue to be de rigueur in 2014, it seems.
Concerns grow over apprenticeships
On the government’s ongoing plans to reform apprenticeships, training guru Jonathan Ledger has cautionary words for printers toying with training: “Be careful what you wish for.”
PrintWeek’s pick of 2013’s top stories
We look back at a year that, although tough, has towards the end seen green shoots of recovery emerge.
Do UK card printers have more to offer than overseas rivals?
Going abroad for Christmas has become commonplace, and not just for holidays. Much of the printing of charity cards for the festive season takes place in the UK, but more and more customers are being...
Will NIC reforms live up to the hype?
The government says 1.25m businesses and charities will see their National Insurance contributions (NICs) cut by up to £2,000 each when the new Employment Allowance is introduced next year. Business...
Offset vendors seek inroads to digital
Call it what you will, the strategic coming together of vendors in the hope of becoming more than the sum of their parts is the topic du jour in print.
Price hikes are real threat to SMEs and could derail recovery
Energy firms “overcharge by £3.7bn a year”, ran one recent newspaper headline. Virtually every national newspaper, in fact, has reported accusations that the UK’s biggest energy companies have...
SMEs must drive push for fairer terms
Late-paying customers have long been the bane of SME business owners, all the more since the credit crunch began in 2007 leading to full-blown financial armageddon in 2008.
Green shoots prompt investment in leaner, meaner sector
Infinity Finishing was one of the lucky ones, but just how lucky only time will tell. The business started in mid October, but unlike many would-be start-ups, this one was made possible with a loan...
Results bear out a radical restructure
It is 2009 and St Ives' chief executive Patrick Martell, who joined the group as an apprentice in 1980, is giving his first major interview since taking the reins in April of the worst year in the...
Shotgun wedding for European paper giants?
As mega-mergers go, the potential combination of UPM and Stora Enso's European paper assets is hard to top. The resulting entity would produce 16m tonnes of paper annually, control 40% of the European...
Confidence crisis is print's opportunity
In tough times, marketing budgets are typically the first to be squeezed. And this, as any printer working with marketers will tell you, has certainly held true over the past few years.
Gender imbalance is costing the industry and the country
Women need work and work needs women, concludes a report from a government-backed industry group that coincides with a new print initiative prompted by the same sentiment.