Rochester, New York — The Gravure Association of America (GAA) has announced the recipients of the 2004 Gravure Persons of the Year Awards. They are Mr. Thomas Coker, Vice President and General Manager, Sonoco Flexible Packaging; and Mr. Thomas A. Quadracci, President, and CEO, Quad/Graphics, Inc. The Gravure Person of the Year Awards provide recognition and honor to outstanding individuals who have contributed unselfishly to the advancement of gravure in the U.S. or internationally. Mr. Coker is Division Vice President and General Manager for the Flexible Packaging Division of Sonoco. He has served in this role since October 2002, managing the Company’s flexible packaging operations in the United States and Canada. Mr. Coker has been employed with Sonoco since 1987. Prior to his present responsibilities for the Flexible Packaging Division, he was Division Vice President, Consumer Products-Europe, where he developed the European market for composite cans. He previously served as General Manager-Packaging Services Division, assisting major consumer products companies in managing their packaging supply chains, including managing the Company’s Pack Centers, folding cartons and graphics management operations. He also served as Director of Marketing for Sonoco’s pressure-sensitive label and folding carton operations and held several positions with the Corporate Planning Department. Mr. Quadracci is President & CEO of Quad/Graphics, the largest privately held commercial printing company in the world. Among Quad/Graphics’ more than 1,000 clients are some of the highest-quality gravure magazines and catalogs in the world. Through a variety of leadership roles, Mr. Quadracci has been instrumental in the growth and success of Quad/Graphics, which he helped launch in Pewaukee, Wisconsin, in 1971. Years later, in 1985, Mr. Quadracci served as the catalyst for Quad/Graphics’ successful entry into the gravure industry. He advised the timing of the company’s entry based on technological advancements (particularly in cylinder engraving) garnered from his years of comprehensive, worldwide research as Quad/Graphics’ Vice President of Manufacturing & Technology – a role in which he also oversaw the company’s burgeoning prepress operations. Mr. Quadracci witnessed that decades of incremental change in the gravure industry added up to a real technological advantage for an upstart like Quad/Graphics. As such, he supervised the acquisition of equipment and finalized the design of the company’s first gravure plant in Lomira, Wisconsin. Today, Mr. Quadracci continues to oversee the company’s brisk gravure expansion, which now includes a 1.6-million-square-foot gravure facility in Martinsburg, West Virginia (opened in 1997), and a brand-new facility in Oklahoma City. Mr. Coker and Mr. Quadracci will be honored at the Gravure Persons of the Year Awards Luncheon on Monday, October 11, 2004, at The Ritz-Carlton in Chicago, Illinois. The entire printing industry is invited. For more information, please contact the GAA at 585-436-2150. Initiated in 1990 by the GAA, former recipients of the Gravure Person of the Year Award are: - Madame Tere Cerutti, 1990 - John Walter, 1991 - Vito J. Colaprico, 1993 - Lester W. Buechler, 1993 - Edward E. Barr, 1996 - H. Howard Flint, II, 1998 - Christopher M. Little, 2000 - Peter Daetwyler, 2002 - Charles G. Cavell, 2002 Proceeds from the Gravure Persons of the Year Award Luncheon support the Gravure Education Foundation (GEF), a not-for-profit charitable organization. Founded in 1979, the mission of the GEF is to promote and support educational development in gravure technology by raising and properly distributing money and resources to deserving educators, institutions, and students. By doing so, the Foundation will motivate and develop individuals with the technical proficiency and leadership skills for the print communications industry. The Gravure Association of America’s mission is to promote the gravure printing process for publication, packaging, and product printing. Members of the Association include many of the nation’s leading printers, publishers, service houses, and engravers, as well as manufacturers of paper, ink, and presses for the gravure industry.