Chambersburg, PA  July 22, 2004 -- New figures released by national consultant ABC Advisors shows that the vast majority of orders awarded to the private sector by the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) are small jobs ideal for filling production holes in most printing operations.   During a 12 month period ending May 31, 2004, printers obtained 104,089 jobs with a value of $2,500 and less to supplement their commercial volume.  This size of orders constituted 84.5% of the total amount of jobs awarded by GPO during that time frame.   This includes work bid and awarded as single jobs and orders placed under term contracts that are awarded for 1 or more years.   "Large jobs with values of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars get all the attention," says Deborah Snider, Vice President of ABC Services, "but it is the readily available small purchases that interested printers pick up in droves each day to enhance profitability."   Snider says a job or two a year of these size purchases will not make a difference on the bottom line of even the smallest operation.  But, a number of these jobs obtained weekly can help cover fixed expenses.  Brent Pflederer of Art & Print, Inc, a small commercial print shop in Washington, IL, agrees.   "In the past 6 1/2 months, we produced over 80 GPO orders which, as a whole, averaged under $1,000 but produced a cumulative value added of about $45,000," Pflederer explains.  "In a down economy where paying bills can be difficult, having that profit to place against fixed overhead is big!"   Pflederer, who utilizes ABC Advisor's services to receive bid invitations that match Art & Print's equipment capabilities, adds that once in a while some overtime is required to fill orders.  Generally, however, he says jobs are easily placed between commercial jobs where unsold capacity exists.   For those printers looking for work slightly larger in value, GPO also awarded another 13,168 jobs during the same year long time period which had a value of over $2,500 but less than $10,000.  The average value of these jobs was $4,737.