March 14, 2003 -- (WhatTheyThink.com) -- CAP Ventures and WhatTheyThink.com have released the findings of a survey conducted recently with nearly 200 printers in the United States. The purpose of the study was to examine paper ordering trends and brand share among the major suppliers. The survey was conducted with printing executives who are members of the WhatTheyThink.com community. The survey inquired about brands of coated and uncoated paper that printers regularly purchase. The results show the brand share for around ten of the leading brands. In both the uncoated and coated paper markets, International Paper (IP) was the brand share leader. IP is the world’s largest paper manufacturer and has a strong presence throughout the US market. They particularly focus on uncoated cut size grades, many of which are run on high speed digital printers and copiers. The company has broad distribution that reaches virtually all US geographic regions and market segments (e.g. commercial printers, quick printers, in-plant shops). Uncoated Paper Brand Share: - International Paper, 60.1% - Weyerhaeuser, 52.0% - Domtar, 35.8% - Boise, 28.3% - Mohawk, 24.9% - Georgia Pacific, 24.9% - Xerox, 12.1% - Willamette (part of Weyerhaeuser), 8.7% - Stora Enso, 8.1% - Smart Papers, 4.6% - Other, 30.1% Coated Paper Brand Share: - International Paper, 48.2% - MeadWestvaco, 35.9% - Georgia Pacific, 30.6% - Weyerhaeuser, 27.6% - Domtar, 27.1% - Smart Papers, 24.1% - Mohawk, 15.3% - Stora Enso, 14.7% - Fraser Paper, 11.2% - Xerox, 10.6% - Finch Pruyn, 5.3% - Other, 35.9% It was surprising to see IP and Georgia-Pacific (GP) emerge as brand share leaders in the coated paper category since they do not have as extensive a product line for the coated grades as they do for the uncoated grades. (Note that this data reflects brand share not market share, and given these companies’ strong presence in the uncoated market they may be benefiting from a slight halo effect in the coated market.) Xerox had a relatively low brand share in the uncoated paper category. Xerox is a leading reseller of uncoated paper, but a large portion of their business comes from the in-plant, central reproduction department, and general office areas of non-print for pay companies. Although Xerox has a very strong presence in the digital printing equipment market among print for pay companies, this presence does not appear to be helping their paper brand share. Companies such as Smart Papers and Stora Enso showed up among the uncoated brand share leaders. Both of these companies have focused on the digital printing market which may be increasing their brand share. In other words, a fairly large number of customers are purchasing these brands of paper, but not a very large amount of the paper. Smart Papers may also be benefiting in the uncoated market from a halo effect of its KromeCote brand of coated paper. *This data is not market share, which factors in the total tonnage or volume that each brand has. Instead, the research measures the extent to which a brand has penetrated the market. In some cases, a large percentage of the market may be purchasing a specific brand, but only buy a small amount of paper. The result would be a high brand share and a low market share. ---- Editor’s Note: Premium Access Members at WhatTheyThink.com can view the complete findings of this survey at www.whattheythink.com. This survey also links to the findings from March 13, 2003 which provided results from print buyers. The survey results with printers include: - More on Brand Share, - Specifying Paper, - Ordering Frequency, - Two-year Trends, - Ordering Volumes, - Digital versus Offset Grades, - Problems with Digital Printing Papers, - Number of Vendors Used by Printers, The results also include cross-tabulation with the printers annual revenue. ----- Demographic Data: Primary business: Approximately 55% of the respondents characterize themselves as general commercial printers primarily offering offset printing services. The other 45% included a mix of digital print specialists (mostly digital), quick printers, prepress services and other graphic service providers. Size of company: The sample is weighted towards medium to large print providers compared with the overall population of companies in the printing industry. Approximately 33% of the printers have annual revenues in excess of $10 million; another 25% have revenues under $1 million. Slightly more companies have revenues in excess of $20 million. Geographic region: There is excellent representation from all major regions in the United States but slightly smaller sample sizes from the Mountain and Pacific regions. Title: The respondents are from senior management levels within their company. Approximately 65% of the respondents are a VP, general manager, President/CEO or owner of their company. Equipment profile: The respondents have a variety of printing equipment including traditional presses, digital production printers, color copiers and wide format printing equipment. The most common device is two-color offset presses owned by just about 60% of print providers. Other common devices include 5+ color offset presses (50%), production black & white digital printers (45%), and color copier/printers (45%), 4-color presses (40%), digital large format printers (40%), digital production color printers (26%).