Viewpoint
April 2003
There is a difference

With a static or slowing print market, depending on who you talk to, the usual questions have been raised again: Has printing become a commodity? Are customers just buying on price alone? Are all printers the same? Why would anyone buy from one printer instead of another unless he had the lowest price? Is being the lowest-cost printer what this industry’s future is all about?
Even if you agree that printing has become a commodity product (something that I don’t believe), does it really mean all printing companies are the same? If you look at other industries that produce commodity products, such as the detergent or beer industry, there’s a lot that we can learn from them.
In reality, all detergent is the same. It is made the same way, with the same material and it does the same thing—it cleans clothes. There are more than 24 brands on the supermarket shelves with the highest price almost double the lowest price. Not bad for a commodity product. The beer industry is just as bad with more brands for premium, light, imported and even imported that is, actually, not imported, than you can count.
What the detergent and beer companies have done well, though, is create a difference in their brands, even if there is little difference in the product. Put lemon scent in it, make it a liquid, or whiten whites even more. In the beer industry, just change the bottle, label or name. Most important of all, what all companies in these two industries have done is divide the market, and appeal to one section of it instead of the entire thing. Whether it’s by income, lifestyle, gender, age or whatever, the companies have created a difference between their brand and all the others in their market, even when the products are the same.

If your company
is not known for anything,
then price is the only thing you can compete on

The trick in the printing industry is you have to create a difference between your company/brand and all the other printing companies/brands out there. If your company/brand does not stand for something unique or different, then the only thing that will differentiate you from other printers is price. Price competition is the absence of effective marketing.
In this industry, the opportunities to differentiate your company/brand from others are almost limitless. You can distinguish yourself by type of printed product (magazines, books, presentation folders, direct mail, stationery), by industry served (financial, hospitality, travel, retail, auto), or by job function (marketing, accounting, operations, purchasing, designers). And all those categories can be subdivided even further. Almost every successful printer I know in this industry is known for something. Hemlock: award-winning work, PLM: direct mail, Friesens: high-end books, Webcom: directories and softbound books, CJ Graphics: high-end stationery, and the list goes on.
If your company/brand is not known for anything, then price is the only thing you can compete on. Any printing company can be different, you just have to find the difference and let customers and potential customers know it.

Alexander Donald is the publisher of Graphic Monthly Canada.
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