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Johnson’s World: Don’t Keep Secrets—You Are the Best Promoter for Print

It’s up to us, the people who “make stuff,” to make sure our friends and neighbors know that print is alive in their communities, and that it needs their support. A century ago no one needed to point out the importance of print as an industry; it was assumed. No longer. We need to be more vocal about the important role we play. In the latest installment of Johnson’s World, Steve Johnson explains what you can do to get the word out.

Wednesday, October 14, 2020

A local organization to which I belong has moved from live to online meetings. In discussing the logistics of this change with the group, one meeting coordinator remarked offhandedly, “We’re all working from home anyway.”

This statement caught me by surprise. I’m not working from home. I’m a printer, with a shop full of people, making stuff. We’ve been declared essential. You can’t run such an operation remotely.

When community groups are dominated by professionals and public-sector employees, it becomes easy for the public to fall prey to false impressions: that no one actually prints anymore and that everyone works remotely in their pajamas, filling in Excel spreadsheets and dispatching emails from a makeshift office in the spare bedroom.


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About Steve Johnson

Steve Johnson is a successful print owner and digital pioneer. Each month in Johnson’s World, he offers up his take on the day-to-day world of graphic communications.

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