Lexington, Kentucky USA -- WhatTheyThink.com today announced that industry professionals from around the world registered to attend a free printing industry educational webinar. Key Turnaround Metrics for Enhancing your Printing Operation, led by financial, turnaround and M&A veterans Paul Reilly and Stuart Margolis of New Direction Partners. The event was held Wednesday, October 21^st.

The webinar archive can be viewed at the webinar archive page.

“There is no question that these are difficult times for the printing industry, with a number of pressures including the current recessionary period,” said Reilly. “Yet there are key metrics for ensuring continued profits even during difficult times. This session included an in-depth discussion of using Value Added per Payroll Dollar as a key metric and methods for managing to this metric for higher profitability. Our objective was to leave attendees with new ideas and actionable suggestions they could implement immediately to improve business performance.”

Reilly and Margolis are well-known in the industry.

• Paul Reilly:  Prior to New Direction Partners, Paul was Chief Executive Officer, President and Chairman of the Board of Cenveo, Inc., one of North America’s leading printing firms. During his ten years at Cenveo, the firm grew from $17 million to almost $2 billion in sales with more than 10,000 employees, 86 plants and numerous sales offices throughout North America. The company grew rapidly through acquisitions, completing some 60 acquisitions and numerous capital raisings, and created over 17% CAGR in shareholder returns. Under his leadership, Cenveo was voted second place in the printing and publishing category as Fortune Magazine's Most Admired Companies of 2004 and ranked number ten of the Russell 3000 companies on Corporate Governance Quotients by Institutional Shareholder Services. Reilly is also the founding Chairman of the Print Council.
• Stuart Margolis.  Stuart Margolis is a preeminent financial expert in the printing industry. Most notably, he is recognized for profit planning that enables companies to grow through increased sales, capacity expansion, acquisition and cost optimization. Methodologies developed in his books A Printer’s Chart of Accounts and A Printer's Guide to Profits, 1-2-3 - The Key: Value Added Financial Management are implemented by thousands of printing companies nationwide. He complies the annual PIA Financial Ratio Study for the industry, its premier competitive benchmarking tool. Mr. Margolis dedicates time and expertise to the industry as a featured speaker at conferences and instructor of educational seminars for associations and corporations. He is widely published in print industry business and professional journals. A Certified Public Accountant, Mr. Margolis holds a Bachelors Degree from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business in Economics and Accounting and a Masters in Taxation from Villanova University. He is an active member and consultant for Printing Industries of America (PIA), the National Association for Print Leadership (NAPL), many regional print associations as well as the Pennsylvania and America Institutes of Certified Public Accountants.

“This deep dive into managing against specific business metrics was an excellent opportunity for attendees to take advantage of the knowledge and expertise of Reilly and Margolis,” said Randy Davidson, President, WhatTheyThink. “Their proven methodology should be of value to printing firms of almost every size, and we encourage those who were unable to attend to visit the archive.  We appreciate the New Directions Partners sponsoring this event in order to bring it to our viewers at no charge.”

About New Direction Partners

New Direction Partners provides advisory services in investment banking, valuation, financial advisory and management consulting. Our partners have unparalleled experience, with involvement in over 200 sales and mergers since 1979. We specialize in providing services to the printing, packaging and allied graphic arts industries with an emphasis on mergers and acquisitions.

About WhatTheyThink.com

WhatTheyThink is the printing and publishing industry's leading media organization; offering a wide range of publications delivering unbiased, real-time market intelligence, industry news, economic and trend analysis, peer-to-peer communication, and special reports on emerging technology and critical events. WhatTheyThink also hosts webinars and live events that are timely and relevant o today's busy industry executives along with consulting and speaker services that leverage a talented pool of writers and industry analysts.

WhatTheyThink consists of flagship site WhatTheyThink.com, discussion forum site PrintPlanet.com, and industry blog PrintCEO.com.