Monthly Archives: July 2011

Family misfortunes

By , Friday, 29 July 2011, 4 Comments

Jarrold Printing, Alden, JW Arrowsmith, Sessions of
York… and now Pindar. What a depressing roll call. It’s sad when any business
hits the buffers, but there’s something particularly depressing about a long-established
family firm going under.

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Squealing with delight

By , Tuesday, 26 July 2011, Be the first to comment

This is one of those weeks where in just a few days
enough mega-news has happened to fill a month or two’s worth of PrintWeek front
covers.

The acquisition of Moonpig by Photobox is right up
there when it comes to applause-inducing print-related stories. It hasn’t all
been a faultless upward trajectory for the business, which started out in 2000 just as the
dotcom boom peaked. Moonpig also had its fair share of technical trials and
tribulations, including a near-disastrous episode having its technological
trotters burnt that involved the first (and as it turned out only) sheetfed
digital press made by Xeikon.  

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Welcome words

By , Friday, 22 July 2011, 1 Comment

Take it from me, from a journalist’s point-of-view
it can be extremely tricky writing stories about one’s own employer.

So. At the risk of putting myself in line for one
of Private Eye’s infamous ‘Order of the Brown Nose’ awards, I would just like
to say this: I feel rather proud of the high-ups here at Haymarket Towers who
sanctioned a public statement about the group’s renewed contract with Wyndeham
that included mention of (shock!) print price increases. Haymarket Media Group is, I
believe, the first publisher to do this. I very much hope it won’t be the last.

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Toys for the big boys

By , Thursday, 21 July 2011, 1 Comment

Earlier this month I spent a day
in Leeds, looking at the impressive array of digital
print firepower at Communisis’ Leeds facility, and hearing about the group’s
plans to ultimately migrate all of its high-volume litho print over to
high-volume ink-jet.

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Age. There’s no getting away from it in the end

By , Wednesday, 20 July 2011, Be the first to comment

A recent family event of the nuptial variety meant that
I spent a few days chaperoning a clutch of 80-something year-old relatives.

By the end of the weekend I needed a very large drink
followed by a lie down in a dark room. The 80-somethings were, variously and
collectively: forgetful, prone to falling over, hard of hearing,
disconcertingly random, vague, overly-worried about seemingly inconsequential
things… the list goes on.

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Government procurement predicament

By , Tuesday, 19 July 2011, 3 Comments

The government’s mammoth
print procurement deal with Williams Lea is surely just the inevitable result
of privatising HMSO’s publishing operations back in 1996. The Stationery Office,
as it became, is now part of Williams Lea.

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Reaping the rewards of reward schemes

By , Thursday, 14 July 2011, Be the first to comment

There must be dancing in the streets of Shirebrook today,
after Sports Direct announced trend-bucking profits of �200m – results that
will see 2,000 employees cash in on the firm’s employee bonus share scheme to
the tune of a whopping �90m, garnering an average payout of �40,000.

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NoTW demise turns data gathering opportunity

By , Tuesday, 12 July 2011, Be the first to comment

News International is experiencing the unpleasant taste
of its own medicine this week, as the scandal engulfing the business throws up new
revelations on a seemingly daily basis.

It remains to be seen whether sacrificing the News of
the World is going to prove adequate, or whether the gangrene is spreading to
other limbs. But one thing was evident in the last ever edition of the Sunday
red top: News International has remained characteristically wily and has used the
NoTW’s demise for potential future gain.

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Apocalypse NOTW

By , Friday, 8 July 2011, Be the first to comment

Yesterday afternoon my colleagues and I were positing
about the fact that this Sunday’s News of the World would be a collectors’
edition as it would not carry any advertising.

Just minutes later the statement from News
International announcing the closure of the paper arrived, to the stunned
reaction of all. This, after all, was the first UK newspaper Rupert Murdoch
purchased, back in 1969, and he fought off Robert Maxwell to do so. Thus, Thursday
7 July 2011 became one of life’s momentous news days for everyone involved in
media and the newspaper industry.

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Why I hate junk TV

By , Tuesday, 5 July 2011, 2 Comments

Woke up feeling grumpy this morning, and as brain
kicked in remembered the cause. Last night’s Panorama programme ‘Why hate junk mail?”.

The Panorama team has produced many excellent
programmes in its time, the recent episode exposing scandalous behaviour at care
homes being one.

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