I read with interest the announcement by Las Vegas based Creel of its acquisition of Globalsoft Digital, based in New Jersey with operations in France as well. Chris Petro has done a great job with Globalsoft Digital and has always been on the forefront of technology adoption. Alan Creel’s Las Vegas operation also includes Digital Lizard. With the addition of Globalsoft Digital, he significantly expands his geographic footprint and adds a business that generates about 50% of its revenues from photo specialty printing with the balance from web-based commercial print.

In describing why the acquisition was attractive for him, Petro says, “I describe being an entrepreneur in our industry as a staircase: it goes up, and then it plateaus. That’s been the history of our organization. From an entrepreneurial perspective, you want to make sure your investments in the technology are as low in the staircase as you can to translate to profits progress along the staircase.

“There is already a huge paradigm shift in our industry driven by technology. Sheetfed inkjet is almost ready for prime time, and it is a drupa year, a time during which we as an organization have typically made a lot of investments. Anticipation of this was one driver for putting our business out in the market. The other half is that we had a gaping hole in our business model with respect to distributive print for major clients who have up to 40% of its operations on the West Coast. We needed to address that to give them the time to market they need. But I was not ready to do a partnership on the digital side because of the complexity of what we do for these clients. We were getting a lot of pressure from clients to have a national/international distribution network to that would guarantee the same service levels regardless of geography. And we were also starting to see a big uptick with our accounts in the demand to have a more blended offset/digital offering.” 

I’ve had the pleasure of visiting the Creel plant in the past and have had many conversations with both Chris and Digital Lizard’s Bill Wieners. For Chris, an acquisition needed to show new value for his customers, not just be a money-generating event. By joining the Creel family, he takes advantage of an existing well-run platform. Chris adds, “Everything about Creel made sense, and I have a lot of admiration for Bill’s technical genius. The location of their facilities in Las Vegas and Idaho solved one problem. I also have a lot of respect for Alan. He is one of the few in offset that understands how innovation, digital and marketing all fit. The plant reeks of technology, and his sales forces knows how to sell it. His operation is reflective of that with innovative offset practices, including automated platemaking and very short makereadies. I’m really excited about building the business together, and I suspect the acquisitions won’t stop with Globalsoft.”

What advice and insight does Petro have for his peers? “You can no longer depend on one output technology. It behooves you to have multiple output devices.  Corporate America’s brand owners, the people making campaign decisions, want to go to one source. They want personalization, but their kits also have offset components. The broad-based acceptance of digital is there, and brands are smarter and more educated. At the same time, they are migrating away from a procurement model to a marketing relationship. It’s not unusual to get a call describing a particular job and asking if we have an HP Indigo 10000! That’s how granular their knowledge is becoming these days. Those who have the money to invest are becoming more competitive in the marketplace and represent the next phase of the printing industry’s evolution.”