Reprographics 101

(more than you ever wanted to know about the reprographics industry)

recent posts

about

  • SAN BERNARDINO CITY UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT – REPROGRAPHIC SERVICES RFP NO. 25-11 – Addendum Number One

    RFP response submittal date was August 18, 2011, so this RFP opportunity is closed and now under evaluation.

    Joel’s comments:

    I’ve decided to post “Addendum No. 1”, because the addendum is a Q&A document; shows questions that were asked by vendors and the purchasing department’s response to those questions.

    If you read the addendum (which I’ve posted in my Google Docs library), you’ll see that one of the vendors questioned the “estimated quantities.” And, you will see that rather than providing “reliable” estimated quantities, the addendum states that estimated quantities are just that, “estimated.”

    I’ve pointed out in previous posts, about Government sector procurements, that purchasing agents do little, if any, homework to determine if their estimated quantities bear any semblance of reality. Most often, not. That would take work. Why work, when you get paid for just showing up?

    Here’s a link to the Addendum #1

    http://tinyurl.com/3c56a8h

  • Construction employment statistics – from the AGC

    From AGC’s web-site:

    Press Release

    CONSTRUCTION EMPLOYMENT INCREASES IN 26 STATES AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA IN JULY AND DURING THE PAST 12 MONTHS AS OVERALL EMPLOYMENT REMAINS STAGNANT

    Date: August 19, 2011

    Texas and North Dakota Led Yearly Pickup; Florida and Georgia Experienced the Worst Job Losses; Utah and California Had the Largest Monthly Gains; Texas and Alaska Had the Worst Monthly Losses

    Construction employment increased in 26 states between July 2010 and July 2011 and during the past month, according to an analysis by the Associated General Contractors of America of state employment data released by the Labor Department. The relatively even split between states adding and losing construction jobs was to be expected given the fact that overall employment in construction was relatively stagnant in July, association officials noted.

    Link to complete Press Release … and, please note – at the bottom of the press release, you’ll find a state-by-state listing of job gains and job losses.

    http://www.agc.org/cs/news_media/press_room/press_release?pressrelease.id=892

    Joel’s comment:

    Florida’s construction industry job losses are still very significant. C’mon, Governor Scott, get off your ass and do something about that ugly picture. My friends in the reprographics industry in Florida are in survival mode.

  • ABC Imaging is one of the sponsors of the LADTF (Los Angeles Design Technology Forum)

    LADTF reveals technological insights to LA AEC firms

    Washington, DC—August 15, 2011—The Los Angeles Design Technology Forum (LADTF) launches its fall speaker series on August 18 with a lecture by Dr. Anne Balsamo at UCLA Architecture and Urban Design, DeCafe in Perloff Hall.

    LADTF is presented by ABC Imaging, a Washington, DC-based printing and document management company, and the AIA|LA Technology in Architectural Practice Committee, as well as leading architectural, engineering, and design firms and UCLA AUD.

    “We’re excited to connect talented designers and engineers with emerging technologies,” said Charity Craig, Associate VP, ABC Imaging. “This collaboration encourages growth and development and expands architectural creativity and limits.”

    “The forum defines the way technology impacts the building industry and the built environment today,” said Reg Prentice of Gensler-Los Angeles, “and the opportunity to engage with these speakers brings an important conversation to the Los Angeles design community.”

    From the LADTF web-site – – – “About the LADTF”:

    The Los Angeles Design Technology Forum is a collective organization representing a wide cross-section of architecture and engineering firms and academic institutions around the Los Angeles basin. It serves to increase awareness of technological innovations in design and construction, and to foster their application throughout the Los Angeles design community. By connecting a diverse audience of designers, engineers, builders and owners who have widely varying conceptions of technology in their work, we hope to create new opportunities for efficiency and creativity.

    The Los Angeles Design Technology Forum is coordinated by Marty Doscher, Reg Prentice, Dennis Shelden, Randy Jefferson, and Kurt Komraus. 

The LADTF is brought to you by:

    ABC Imaging

    Synthesis Techology Integration

    Buro Happold

    Gensler

    Jefferson & Associates

    Gehry Technologies

    UCLA Architecture & Urban Design

    AIA Los Angeles Chapter

  • Current Economic Conditions By Federal Reserve District – Fed Beige Book Report – July 27, 2011

    I’ve placed a copy of the 51 page Federal Reserve “Beige Book” Report in my Google Docs library so that those of you who want to read the entire report, and, in particular, the “real estate and construction” sections in each Fed “District”, can do that. At the end of this post, you’ll find a link to the complete report. Give it some time to load; it’s a 51 page report.

    Current Economic Conditions By Federal Reserve District

    July 27, 2011

    These two paragraphs, about Real Estate and Construction, appear in the (national) SUMMARY section:

    Real Estate and Construction

    Residential real estate sales in almost all Districts were little changed from the last Beige Book. Activity edged up in the Richmond, Atlanta, and Minneapolis Districts. Of the Districts reporting on home prices, most said that they were flat or declining. The Boston and Richmond Districts reported steady prices; the Philadelphia and Atlanta Districts reported that prices were steady to down slightly; and the Kansas City and New York Districts reported that prices were down. Increasing inventories of unsold homes in the Boston, New York, and Kansas City Districts have restrained building in the single- family housing sector. Residential construction activity overall was mixed, though it increased in the Minneapolis District. Since the previous Beige Book, construction and activity in the residential rental market have continued to improve in the New York, Chicago, Dallas, and San Francisco Districts.

    Nonresidential real estate activity improved somewhat in the Boston, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Chicago, St. Louis, and Dallas Districts. The Chicago District reported strong demand for industrial facilities, particularly from the automotive sector. The Philadelphia District reported improvements in terms of lower vacancy rates for office space, industrial space, and apartments; the Chicago District reported generally lower vacancy rates. The New York, Richmond, Atlanta, Minneapolis, Kansas City, and San Francisco Districts all reported generally weak activity in nonresidential real estate. Construction in the Minneapolis District stalled in areas because of flooding and unavailability of state building inspectors due to the Minnesota state government shutdown. Health care and apartment construction was a bright spot for the Atlanta District. Activity was weak in the Kansas City District, but firms that supply construction materials reported increased sales and stable prices. San Francisco reported stable but high vacancy rates in many parts of the District.

    Link to complete Fed Reserve “Beige Book” Report:

    http://tinyurl.com/3ngflzt

  • More on Autodesk stock (ADSK)…. cratered even further today

    I’ve stated this before, so this is just a reminder. There used to be a slogan, “when E.F. Hutton talks, people listen” …. and I coined the term, “when Joel buys, sell.” Let me go on, and you’ll see why I’m giving you this reminder….

    Earlier today, I did a post about the cratering of Autodesk’s (ADSK) stock. I said that even though Autodesk came out with good results, its stock cratered.

    Well, it’s now after the closing bell on Friday, and Autodesk’s stock continued to crater today, closing at $23.41, down $3.10 today, down 11.7% for the day. Wow!

    That also means that Autodesk’s stock has fallen 40% since July 23, 2011, when the stock was trading at $36.61. (And the 52 week high for this stock, per Google, was $46.15.) Wow!

    Okay, here’s why I reminded you that, “when Joel buys, sell.”…… On Monday, I’m going to buy a serious chunk of Autodesk stock for my long-term, non-dividend paying portfolio. I think ADSK is now seriously undervalued. This is your signal to “short” ADSK! In other words, if you do the opposite of what I’m going to do, you’ve got an 80% chance of winning.

    From an article on BeaconEquity.com (stock market watch) late this afternoon:

    Autodesk Quarterly Sales Update

    8/19/2011 2:13:42 PM

    Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ:ADSK). Last Market Price: 23.6, Change: -2.91, % Change: (-10.98%). Shares trade in the range of 23.51 – 27.40 dollars. It has a market capitalization of 5.45B dollars, making it a Mid Cap Stock and has 230.95M outstanding shares. The company has a beta of 2.11, indicating, the stock to be more volatile than the market. As per the most recent quarterly report, the net income per share (EPS) is 1.04; P/E of 22.69. It operates in Technology sector and belongs to Software and Programming industry. Percentage shares held by institutional investors is 93%. The company has a 52 week high of $ 46.15 and a 52 week low of $ 23.51. Average volumes of shares traded daily are 4,190,000. Volume traded in the last session was at 12,120,000, 2.89 times the average volume.

    For Q2 (Apr ’11), It had a Net profit margin of 13.12%, an Operating margin of 14.88%. Other Key stats and ratios are : Return on average assets of 9.77%, Return on average equity of 16.54%. The organization has an employee strength of 6,800

    Senior management consists of Carl Bass, ( Age: 53 ), as President, Chief Executive Officer, Director, Mark J. Hawkins, ( Age: 52 ), as Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President and Christopher Bradshaw, ( Age: 48 ), as Senior Vice President, Chief Marketing Officer. Pascal W. Di Fronzo, ( Age: 46 ), as Senior Vice President, General Counsel, Secretary Jan Becker, ( Age: 58 ), as Senior Vice President – Human Resources and Corporate Real Estate

    Consensus Recommendation is a Outperform.

    Estimate for sales for the Quarter Ending Oct-11 show a mean of 540.80 million dollars, an estimate high of 549.00 million dollars and an estimate low of 528.90 million dollars. A year ago the figures stood at 521.07 million dollars.

    Estimate for sales for the Quarter Ending Jan-12 show a mean of 582.21 million dollars, an estimate high of 599.40 million dollars and an estimate low of 565.06 million dollars. A year ago the figures stood at 559.12 million dollars.

    Estimate for EPS for the Quarter Ending Oct-11 show a mean of 0.41 dollars, an estimate high of 0.43 dollars and an estimate low of 0.39 dollars. A year ago the figures stood at 0.39 dollars.

    Estimate for EPS for the Quarter Ending Jan-12 show a mean of 0.46 dollars, an estimate high of 0.49 dollars and an estimate low of 0.40 dollars. A year ago the figures stood at 0.44 dollars.

    Sales for Quarter Ending Jul-11 was estimated at 539.29 million dollars, however the actual sales figure stood at 546.30 million dollars, 7.01 million dollars more than estimates.

    Sales for Quarter Ending Apr-11 was estimated at 523.23 million dollars, however the actual sales figure stood at 528.30 million dollars, 5.07 million dollars more than estimates.

  • The IRgA is planning to hold a networking event at the upcoming SGIA conference and trade show in New Orleans

    I received an e-mail, this morning from Bob Roperti, IRgA President, advising me that “the IRgA Board is moving forward with the planning of a networking event in conjunction with the SGIA New Orleans event.”


    As soon as the details are firmed up, I will post the details on this blog. (I’m sure the IRgA will do that as well, on its web-site.)


  • Autodesk (ADSK) reports excellent sales and profits. Nonetheless, share price falls off the cliff

    Yesterday afternoon (August 18, 2011), Autodesk (ADSK) reported results for the second quarter of its 2012 fiscal year ….. on a day when the Dow Jones Industrial Average sank by nearly 500 points. Kind of depressing, I think, for a company to report excellent sales and profits, only to watch its stock tank because the overall market is in a tanking mode.

    DISCLOSURE: I am now “long” ADSK shares. (Morningstar Research just upgraded ARC to a ***** (five star) stock.

    Autodesk shares were trading at $45.99 on May 12, 2011. Since then, Autodesk shares have fallen off the cliff; when I checked this morning, Autodesk shares were trading at $24.92 !!!

    Brief snapshot of Autodesk’s results:

    AUTODESK REPORTS 16 PERCENT SECOND QUARTER REVENUE GROWTH

    Strong Growth of EPS and Cash Flow from Operations

    SAN RAFAEL, Calif., August 18, 2011— Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK) today reported financial results for the second quarter of fiscal year 2012.

    Revenue was $546 million, an increase of 16 percent compared to the second quarter of fiscal 2011.

    GAAP operating margin was 17 percent, compared to 17 percent in the second quarter of fiscal 2011.

    Non-GAAP operating margin was 25 percent, compared to 25 percent in the second quarter of fiscal 2011. A reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP results is provided in the accompanying tables.

    GAAP diluted earnings per share were $0.30, compared to $0.25 in the second quarter of fiscal 2011.

    Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share were $0.44, compared to $0.36 in the second quarter of fiscal 2011.

    Cash flow from operating activities was $132 million, compared to $112 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2011.

    After ADSK released its results yesterday afternoon, ADSK held an “earnings call” with analysts who follow the company. You can access a transcript of the earnings call at www.seekingalpha.com (enter ticker: ADSK). If you do access the transcript, be sure to read not just the transcript of the company’s statements, but the Q&A transcript (accessed by clicking on the Q&A tab.)

    Below, I’ve copied into this post some of the comments made by Autodesk’s CEO, Carl Bass and I’ve also copied into this post one of the questions Carl Bass was asked and the response he gave to that question.

    Carl Bass

    “Thanks, Dave, and good afternoon, everyone. Financial markets grew weaker and more volatile by the week. Today was certainly no exception. It’s a bit surreal announcing our results after the close of today’s market, since we have lots of positive news to report.

    Across the board, our key financial metrics was strong, with growth across all geographies and business segments, better-than-expected operating margins and profitability and continued strong cash flow. Hoping driver growth was an increase in the demand for our suites.

    There are several areas of notable growth and achievement. Highlights for the quarter include 16% growth in total revenue, 45% growth in total suites revenue, 24% growth in revenue from Asia-Pacific, 20% growth in record revenue in Manufacturing, 19% growth in AEC, 37% growth in maintenance billings, 22% growth in non-GAAP EPS, 18% growth in cash flow from operations, strong operating margins and record deferred revenue.”

    And, later on, Bass says…..

    “Our Infrastructure Design Suites began shipping in early July and sales of Revit-related products have the biggest quarter ever. Suites was another driver of growth in Q2. All of our suites offer a tremendous value to our customers, and we couldn’t be more pleased with the initial uptake of our newly launched design in creation suites. We’re having success in selling suites to new customers and migrating existing customers from point products in older suites into our new suites.

    At their core, our suites facilitate the migration to model-based 3D design tools and helps eliminating the purchasing and interoperability complexity of stand-alone point products. They also increase value by improving the customers’ workflow. It’s a clear win-win scenario for our customers and for us.”

    And, later on, Bass says…..

    “At our investor day event in June, I spoke to you about Autodesk’s initiatives utilizing the cloud. Later this quarter, we’ll be introducing a collection of new web-based services, adding unlimited computing power to our offering. This will transform the way our customers work by helping them design, visualize, simulate and share ideas more rapidly and effectively than they’ve ever been able to do before. Stay tuned for the launch and more details in the coming months.”

    And, here’s one of the questions one of the analysts asked and Bass’ response to that question:

    Sterling Auty – JP Morgan Chase & Co

    “Okay. And then a follow-up on those, on the suite side, can you give us a sense of the order of magnitude, which of the suites is contributing the most now? And how should that evolve over, let’s say, the next 12 months?”

    Carl Bass

    “Yes, I think the biggest contributor and the biggest surprise to the upside has been in the Building Design Suite, particularly because as we looked at the macroeconomic factors going on, this would not be a particular time you would have guessed that the Building Design Suite would be leading the charge, given all the economic factors out there. So that’s pretty much surprised us the most. But the Product Design Suite’s done well. Some of the — and both of those are building off previously existing suites. The numbers on the other seats, like Factory Design Suite, Plant Design Suite, the basic design suite, those all are coming off much smaller bases and the movement from point products. So while the growth has been — exceeded our expectations, those numbers are relatively small.”

    Additional comments made by Carl Bass:

    “Revit adoption has really been strong. Revit is closely tied in the markets of this concept of BIM or building information modeling. BIM has been on a roll, it’s way past the tipping point, it’s doing incredibly well. People are thinking about BIM not only in terms of buildings, but in terms of civil infrastructures. So it’s been doing really, really well. It’s been doing well across the world, lots of countries, it’s doing really well. We’re seeing it strong in United States, we’re seeing it strong in EMEA, particularly Australia and New Zealand. And the thing that I find most exciting about it is that early on in the rollout of Revit, there was a lot of adoption by the architectural community. As we proceeded further, there’s a huge take-up in what’s going on with engineering firms, as well as what’s going on in construction with the large, general contractors. And that’s obviously a much bigger portion of this global $4.2 trillion industry.”

  • RSA releases August Newsletter and highlights its association with CSI's Partner Program

    In its August 2011 Newsletter, RSA announces its association with CSI (Construction Specifications Institute) and says this:

    The organization is especially proud to be the first reprographic organization to work directly with CSI to help its members attain CSI’s Construction Document Technologist certificate (CDT). RSA and its members are committed to staying relevant and providing the tools and services demanded by today’s integrated construction project delivery teams.

    Here’s the beginning of the Newsletter:

    CSI welcomes the Reprographic Services Association (RSA) to the Corporate Partner Program. RSA is an organization of 80+ reprographic companies with more than 190 locations in geographical markets of all sizes across the United States, Canada and the Caribbean. RSA members have served the AEC communities in their markets for decades, providing plan room services, large and small format printing, color graphics and document management services. Along with serving these needs in local communities, RSA members enjoy the benefit of being a part of the global RSA print network. Construction teams, no matter where their members are located, can count on the RSA network to provide the communication backbone for effective team communications and a network of experts to meet the challenges of project deadlines and requirements – across town or across the continent.

    RSA represents the true embodiment of the entrepreneurial spirit! The organization is especially proud to be the first reprographic organization to work directly with CSI to help its members attain CSI’s Construction Document Technologist certificate (CDT). RSA and its members are committed to staying relevant and providing the tools and services demanded by today’s integrated construction project delivery teams. Project stakeholders can be confident that when working with RSA members, they are engaging the services of trained, certified professionals who understand the complexities and needs of each project.

    In the Newsletter, RSA also talks about its 10th Anniversary Celebration (of the merger of RDA and ASA that formed RSA as we know it today), which will be held October 13-15, 20“ in Key West, Florida. A wonderful place to visit, at that time of the year!

    You can access the Newsletter at this link:

    http://tinyurl.com/3jhwcmk

    (My thanks to Randy Watterson, Business Development, Triton Street, LLC for providing me the link to the “on-line” version of the RSA Newsletter.)



  • Do you need help identifying GPO Bid and Program Opportunities? (POST UPDATED AUG 18)

    This post updated, August 18, 2011 to add this:

    One of our blog-visitors said this to us in an e-mail this morning (so we are updating our post about GPO work):

    Hi Joel,

    Regarding GPO bidding…you can bid on GPO jobs through GPO’s “quick quote” system:

    https://securessl.access.gpo.gov/cc/openjobs.aspx

    “It’s very easy to register and quote jobs….most quotes are posted one day and closed the next…most jobs are offset print, but we have quoted on some “form” and “pamphlet” jobs….(duplication, not reprographic work)…IMO, nobody buys printing this inexpensively….”

    Okay, here’s the rest of the original post….

    Actually, I personally don’t think it’s all that hard for printers and reprographers to research and identify GPO (Government Printing Office) bid opportunities, if they really want them. If I’m recalling this correctly (from my older days, when our reprographics company was based in the Washington, DC area (home office of the GPO), there were two types of GPO procurements: a) “One-Time Bid” Procurements (single jobs, single orders) and b) Program procurements – program procurements cover on-going work (multiple orders over an extended period of time) for the GPO (or for an agency the GPO was sourcing printing/reprographics for.)

    But, if you need help, check out this Press Release.

    Tools Help Print Shops Win GPO Work

    PRESS RELEASE

    First two paragraphs of the Press Release…..

    Using tools designed for a specific job can make the difference between the job being completed successfully… or not. That is certainly true with household projects. For starters, it helps to know where to find your tools, have them in one place and organized. When you need that phillips head screwdriver, you want to be able to put your hands on it and not waste time looking for it. Construction professionals depend on tools designed for specific jobs, and they keep them organized so they are easily accessible because time is money to them.

    According to Deborah Snider, senior vice president of e-LYNXX Corporation, and president of its Government Print Management division, the same is true for printers seeking work through the United States Government Printing Office (GPO) which awards millions of dollars in federal government printing to private sector printers each year. Last year, the total was $358 million to more than 1,700 printers of all sizes across the United States.

    Go to this Internet address to read the full press release…

    http://www.myprintresource.com/press_release/10325305/tools-help-print-shops-win-gpo-work

  • Bluebeam PDF Revu document markup and collaboration software, available in desktop and cloud versions, can now work inside the enterprise…

    From a June article I just found on “The BrainYard – InformationWeek”

    “Bluebeam PDF Revu document markup and collaboration software, available in desktop and cloud versions, can now work inside the enterprise on local servers.”

    After increasing the collaboration features of its PDF Revu document markup software with a cloud service, Bluebeam Software is introducing a local server version.

    The new Studio Server product is an alternative to Bluebeam Studio, which the company began offering last year as a free service for anyone who had purchased a license to PDF Revu, a desktop software product that can be used to generate and annotate documents in Adobe’s portable document format.

    When connected through either the cloud or locally hosted versions of Bluebeam Studio, PDF Revu users can collaborate on a document in real time, seeing each other’s annotations and navigation through a document, or post changes for a collaborator to review later. Adobe offers its own collaboration technologies, such as Adobe Connect and Adobe LiveCycle, but BlueBeam has found a niche addressing complex document markup requirements, particularly for engineers and architects.

    Even though Bluebeam Studio is available at no additional cost, Bluebeam CEO Richard Lee said the company heard the demand from some customers who wanted to host their own documents internally for security reasons. The company is obliging with Studio Server, which is priced at $9,995. “This gives our customers all the benefits Bluebeam Studio, while letting them move it from the cloud to behind the company’s firewall,” Lee said.

    One common use of Bluebeam Studio is to pass around blueprints or other technical drawings and have them marked up by a team of collaborators who may not all have the same CAD software available. While the changes may ultimately have to be implemented back in the original file, using the original CAD software, Bluebeam replaces the paper-based process of marking up printouts of the drawings. Also, because the collaboration occurs around an image of the document, rather than the original, the integrity of the original is preserved.

    “Often, the content creator doesn’t necessarily want to allow others to update or control his content,” Lee said. For that reason, Bluebeam can address scenarios that don’t necessarily work within a system like Google Docs, which allows multiple people to make changes to a document in real time. With that approach, “you may edit out a paragraph before I can add my comments to it,” Lee said.

    In contrast, Bluebeam document collaboration is conducted around annotations overlaid on the original document, without altering the original. “So you can say I think we should take out this paragraph, and I can say, no leave it in, and then we can have a discussion about that,” Lee said.

    Although Adobe Acrobat provides its own document markup tools, PDF Revu provides a more elaborate set of tools for drawing, highlighting, and annotation. In a demo, Lee showed a whole library of proofreading annotations Bluebeam created as part of its work with a publisher.

    PDF Revu is available in a $179 per user standard edition, a $239 CAD edition that integrates with computer assisted design tools, and a $299 extreme edition with additional document markup and management tools.