PINE has announced that J.S. McCarthy Printers of Augusta, Maine is an award winner in the Association’s New England regional Awards of Excellence Competition. The announcement was made April 16 during PINE’s 2015 Industry Awards Gala, held at the Newton Marriott in Newton, MA, with hundreds of industry professionals in attendance. PINE’s Awards of Excellence Competition, attracted over 300 entries from 40 printing and imaging companies across New England competing in a variety of printing and graphic communications categories such as best annual report, direct mail campaign, labels & packaging, and more.

J.S. McCarthy won 10 Pinnacle Awards (Best of Category) and 3 Awards of Recognition, and 2 Awards of Merit. A panel of judges with extensive experience in printing and print production, were brought in to examine the wide range of work submitted. Each entry was judged anonymously on its own merit in a category with similar printed pieces. The judging criteria included: registration, clarity and neatness, sharpness of halftones and line drawings, richness and tonal qualities of color, paper and ink selection, ink coverage, difficulty of printing, effective contrast or softness, overall visual impact and bindery.

“Our judges have a total of 80 years of print production experience and are invited across the country to other PIA associations to judge so they have seen all levels of print,” said Christine Hagopian, PINE’s Director of Programs. “Even though the number of entries was not as large as some of the other associations they felt the quality of PINE members' entries took a back seat to no one. Our members should be very proud of that.”