RJ Young expands its production print footprint with Kodak digital presses.
Above: Josh Santos (left) and AJ Baggott (right) have found the Kodak digital presses have raised RJ Young’s production print offerings to new levels.
RJ Young, based in Nashville, Tennessee, is not hesitant to blaze trails. Its foray into production print is an excellent example. Three years ago, RJ Young partnered with Kodak to add high-volume presses to its production print offerings. It was already selling production and light production devices from Canon U.S.A. and Ricoh USA, but the addition of Kodak’s NexPress cut-sheet digital press and NEXFINITY sheetfed digital press has raised RJ Young’s production print offerings to a new level.
Production print represents a sizable percentage of its yearly revenues—about 10% of total hardware sales and close to 17% of total aftermarket. After a 2020 in line with what many dealers experienced, optimism is high for returning this segment of the business to pre-2020 profitability and beyond. Key to growth within the production print arena is selling more of the Kodak devices.
“We’re going to continue to see declines in the core A3 market for our business,” observed AJ Baggott, RJ Young’s COO. “What we’ve lost from COVID probably isn’t coming back at least at any material level. Our best bet for those clicks is in the A4 space, managed print, and production. Production is inevitably going to have to grow as a portion of our business or our business is going to decline.”
Picture This
The inspiration for partnering with Kodak was a bid to provide managed services to a large health care company. Its marketing department also needed a machine that could print metallic and white inks, as well as matte finishes. RJ Young did not have a device with those capabilities or that could handle the hospital’s projected monthly volumes among its current production print offerings, but the dealership’s production print specialist at the time knew that Kodak did.
Above: Baggott (left) and Santos appreciate the image quality of the Kodak digital presses as do the dealership’s customers.
The upshot was that RJ Young added the Kodak machines to its stable, was awarded the contract, and have since placed several more Kodak presses with other customers.
“Partnering with Kodak has been a game-changer,” said Josh Santos, RJ Young’s director of production print. “From an image quality and a consistency standpoint, their machines are industry-leading. I’d put it up against any digital press in the industry for repeatability and color accuracy.”
RJ Young’s partnership with Kodak is somewhat unique in the independent dealer channel because Kodak doesn’t often engage with independent dealers. But RJ Young isn’t just any independent dealer. With 30 locations across the Southeast and yearly revenues of more than $100 million, the dealership packs a lot of power in terms of market reach and breadth of product offerings.
“When you’re the size of an RJ Young, you get a little more attention,” acknowledged Santos.
For customers that run 300,000 to 600,000 prints a month and want the first print and the 600,000th to look exactly alike, the Kodak does the trick, according to Santos. “The Kodak is built solid and handles high volumes on a consistent basis.”
The device’s repeatable color capability resonates with customers, particularly when printing logos.
“I tell people that it’s important when a company spends a lot of money to develop a logo and the color they want associated with their brand,” explained Santos. “If you can match that on the output, it’s a no-brainer.”
Santos also gives high marks to the color registration. Often, when running high volumes, the registration tends to shift on some digital devices. If the machine is made of plastic or has plastic guides, those components wear out. That has not been an issue with the Kodak machines.
“The registration is extremely tight,” stated Santos.
The machines also incorporate Heidelberg technology, a name familiar to commercial printers, which helps get RJ Young in the door.
Santos also likes the long-sheet capability of those devices and the ability to add embellishments such as gold and metallic inks, along with raised clear ink, which has been an asset.
Another advantage of the Kodak machines is the ability to print a fifth color. With the Kodak press, changing to a fifth color can be done in five to 10 minutes compared to other machines, where it is a more time-consuming process, according to Santos.
Pricing for the Kodak presses ranges from $300,000 to more than $1 million. The models that RJ Young sells range from $400,000 to $700,000.
Service-related issues, for now, are handled by Kodak. That will change as RJ Young places more of those presses with customers.
“They wanted us to get six to eight placed before training our people to service them, which is where we can start getting some real value,” explained Baggott. “Some of these machines are running a million color clicks a month. We’re now at a point to start getting that in-house training and servicing them ourselves.”
The hope is that RJ Young can eventually serve as Kodak’s Southeast distribution and service arm, similar to how it handles distribution and service for many Ricoh production machines sold by Ricoh’s direct operations.
“We’ve mastered the art of being the big fish in a lot of small ponds in the Southeast,” said Baggott. “We have offices in places where it doesn’t necessarily make sense for a direct branch to be. We’re hoping to develop the same kind of relationship with Kodak.”
Revamping Production
Santos has a rich history in the production print space, including a former stint with RJ Young as a production print specialist. He’s been around print his entire life. His grandfather, father, and uncles have all owned or worked in print shops. After high school, he worked in sales for a Xerox agent. During that time, he acquired various certifications related to color output and production print. Last fall, he rejoined the dealership to help revamp its production print operations, including creating a new outlook and perception of the production print team across all RJ Young geographies.
According to Baggott, part of the issue was the previous way RJ Young ran its production print business. It put too much emphasis on “fast plastic” (light production), which the team considered production, but was mostly high-speed black & white machines placed in churches and schools.
“That’s important, but it’s not the same from a profitability and growth perspective of the company that true production color is and has been already with us under Josh,” observed Baggott.
Revamping the production print operations has meant becoming a more solutions-oriented organization and hiring more solutions and software specialists.
“From a production print standpoint, anybody can sell hardware and fast plastic,” opined Santos. “We set ourselves apart by offering our clients a total solution.”
RJ Young wants customers and prospects to view them as experts on the machines and the output, and the workflow associated with them.
“It’s a different level of buyer, and it requires a different level of expertise to understand the needs of the buyer and sell to that,” said Baggott. “We have production-specific programs, production-specific webinars, and training targeting that space because otherwise, I don’t think you can sell to a more sophisticated end-user without having a level of expertise to deliver that problem-solving.”
A huge emphasis was placed on this initiative in 2020. And while the pandemic created some speed bumps, it also accelerated the initiative in ways that it might not have in pre-pandemic days.
“COVID presented an opportunity for a lot of people to cut programs,” observed Baggott. “We took it as an opportunity that there was a lot of talent out there and revamped production by hiring a lot of that talent, including Josh.”
Those investments have paid off, and under Santos, they’ve accelerated toward the end of the year.
“Since we brought Josh and several other specialists on board in the middle to late 2020, we sold more in the fourth quarter of 2020 than the other nine months of the year combined in the production space,” reported Baggott.
Forward Progress
Like all segments of the imaging technology industry, the production print space continues to improve with age, which is especially evident at the high end of the market with digital presses.
“Jobs that used to take a week or two weeks to produce can be turned around in a day or two,” said Santos about one of the biggest changes he’s seen in the past 20 years.
The pandemic has impacted print as well.
“COVID accelerated a lot of print that may have been pushed to the wayside,” observed Santos. “Last year, I was working from home 90% of the time. I don’t think there’s been a time in my life that I’ve received higher-quality direct mail pieces.”
He expects to see a heavier focus on image quality moving forward.
Similarly, as new products emerge and old technologies improve, Santos expects RJ Young and its customers to reap the rewards of the evolutionary changes in production print technology. Besides selling the Kodak NexPress and NEXFINITY, Santos would love to add its inkjet machines to the mix, along with workflow solutions and software associated with the hardware. He is also excited about the emergence of label printers and the new generation of wide-format devices, further bolstering RJ Young’s digital print portfolio.
However RJ Young’s production print operations evolve, the Kodak presses will maintain a prominent position at the highest end of the dealership’s production print offerings. And that could lead to even more high-end offerings.
“We’ve proven that we can go upstream with the Kodaks, so I’d like to see us continue to push that,” concluded Baggott.
Canon and Ricoh
Canon and Ricoh are equally important vendors in RJ Young’s production print portfolio.
“I can’t say enough about Canon,” said Santos. “They’re one of the leaders in the industry for a reason. I have a great relationship with their production print team. Canon is a top-notch organization. We’ve had great experiences with the 8000s, 10000s, 910s, and 850s.”
When RJ Young places a Canon machine in an in-plant or commercial print shop, customers are often satisfied with the device.
“Canon has built a solid device with the imagePRESS series,” noted Santos. “The varioPRINT [Canon’s sheetfed press] speaks for itself. We don’t have a lot of issues with Canon production products once they are in the field. The customers love them; the service guys love them.”
He also gives high marks to Canon support.
“I love their second-level support,” said Santos. “If our technicians get in a jam and they can’t get the problem solved on their own, they can call Canon’s second-level support, and they’re up and running in a matter of minutes.”
The relationship with Ricoh is excellent as well, particularly Ricoh’s service and support.
“The specialists there are really supportive,” said Santos.
Above: With former Ricoh production print talent now on the RJ Young team, Ricoh is getting more attention at the Nashville-based dealership.
“The current machines from a performance perspective, are the best generation we’ve seen from Ricoh since we got into the production space,” added Baggott. “Ricoh seems to be getting really serious about production, both in the way that they’re approaching it with dealers and the performance of the equipment. We’re seeing a lot more confidence in the Ricoh equipment with the current generation of products.”
Historically, under RJ Young’s previous approach to selling production, it sold few Ricoh production machines. Under the division’s old leadership, the focus was on Canon.
“A lot of the folks Josh has brought in are from Ricoh,” revealed Baggot. “They’ve cut a lot of their production personnel and we have found a lot of talent there.”
Because of this talent influx, Ricoh production is receiving a lot more attention from RJ Young’s production print team.
With three solid production print vendors, how does RJ Young’s production print team determine which brand gets the most love when meeting with customers and prospects?
“I talk application, application, application,” said Santos. “Whatever makes the most sense for the customer that’s what we lead with.”
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