Jim Koleske is Vice President of National Accounts at Synergy Graphics. He has a Bachelor of Fine Arts with a concentration in Graphic Design and Advertising. Jim has spent 10 years in print and packaging sales, 3 years as a typesetting and lithoprep sales and 2.5 years as a Graphic Artist.

Synergy Graphics is a complete printer with 4 distinct areas of concentration: packaging division, direct mail business, P.O.P and general commercial. The Minneapolis based firm is experiencing tremendous growth in their packaging and direct mail business. Their structural design team continues to create award winning P.O.P advertising and value added packaging concepts.

Jim, tell us more about the make-up of Synergy Graphics.

We are a private multi-million dollar full service printing company. We are adding a 6 color Komori 1/2 web with some unique rotary diecutting as well as expanding in our variable duplex ink jet capabilities. We have recently upgraded to the new Kodak Approval system and as mentioned the 6 color Komori 1/2 web will help keep up with capacity. We will also be adding more finishing, rotary diecutting and roll to roll laminating of our own board stock in the near future.

Your four areas of focus, tell us about them in more detail and which seems to have the most potential.

We have a premier packaging division, that services a national account base of folding cartons that print,emboss,foilstamp,diecut, fold and glue. This area includes software packaging,retail food packaging,confection packaging,clothing sleeves to name a few.

We have a direct mail business that creates speciality diecut, pop-up style mailers and creative personalized pieces where we utilize the only duplex variable inkjetting system in the midwest that allows you to inkjet on two sides of the sheet any stock weight in one pass.

Our P.O.P and commercial end of the business. This area prints everything from Election Ballots for Venezuela. paper phone cards, P.O.P for Frozen Food aisles in Grocery store to millions of rack brochures for banks around the country. We have the capability to produce inline sheet fed, remoist glue,glow-in-the-dark and scratch off inks. These specialities are sought after in the design community.

Our premiums and promotions business is probably what got us here today. If you have ever reached inside a cereal box and found a paper premium toy, it was probably produced here at Synergy Graphics. We are one of the leading suppliers of paper and plastic printed premiums in the industry. From Disney to Nickelodeon, and Pokemon to pogs, if we lined them all up they would stretch around the world a few times. We are the idea people when it comes to premiums.

Do you think overall print spending will continue to grow?

I think the volume of printing will increase over the next few years. If you asked me that 3 years ago I would have said the opposite, but I think we have seen the power of the internet and still see the added request for information in print media and the need for internet companies to get from the net to paper.

How does Synergy Graphics market to area businesses?

We are in the middle of creating a new brochure and have recently been asked by one of our larger customer to provide them a web based infomercial for them to post on their intranet for buyers to view and determine which vendor best fits their needs on a current project. We are also looking into a mini CD rom infomercial.

Print buyers always hear about printers with different capabilities and how they need to be aware that one printer may not have the right equipment for every job under the sun. What is your take?

Print buyers should understand the size of equipment and what best fits where. You should realize that 1000-1500 4 color 8.5 X 11 don't fit a printer with only 40" equipment. He or she can print it but you won't be getting your best value.

Any other tips for print buyers?

Work with your printer before the project is designed. You can save yourself thousands of dollars by eliminating fluffy unrelated things. Be courteous to your print suppliers, there is alot of work behind the scenes to put together a quote on some complex projects, and remember to communicate, put it in writing so all vendors get the same information and if you don't mind a substitute paper stock, put that on your request. Some printers take great buying power advantage for their house sheets. Most of us are here to bend over backwards to please a customer.If you can give a day on some deadlines once in while some printers can really use it.