Printpapa.com is a successful online printing company founded 15 years ago in Santa Clara California, in the heart of the Silicon Valley, where they were growing with the support of the many tech startups. According to owner Shawn Nag, when they started, they saw an opportunity to create an online printing site to support customers and streamline internal processes. At the time there weren’t many online printing sites in that region, so they felt that it would resonate with the high-tech customer base and make them more competitive.
As a former software developer himself, Shawn initially built the website himself as a way to allow customers to check “the prices of the week”, but ultimately decided to add standard products to the site that they could produce in house. When the orders were placed on the new site, they found themselves having to manually collect and impose the input files to prepare them for print production. Once the site construction was complete, and the business started to take off they realized that the manual process was not going to scale and they looked for a more automated way to import, impose and process the input files.
In 2008, he came across Ultimate Impostrip® and realized that the automated workflow and hot folder support was a perfect way to solve his problem. He found that he could streamline is process by mapping each of his different products on the website to a configured and published hot folder in Ultimate Impostrip®. As he added different products to the website all he had to do was just configure and publish another hot folder to support the requirements of that product. Using an automated pipeline workflow that he implemented, he captures the imposed PDF file from Ultimate Impostrip® and directs it to the appropriate press for printing. Initially he started with about 10 products and hot folders and he now has over a thousand products and growing. One of the bigger advances for printpapa.com was the introduction of Ultimate Impostrip® AutoFlow (ganging) functionality. This has enabled them to reduce the number of hot folders by product by using AutoFlow supported hot folders based on sheet size and finishing requirements, streamlining new product setup, production and waste even further.
Automating their workflows has enabled them to go from one AB Dick single color press with a T-head printing letterheads and business cards 15 years ago, to a mix of offset, digital and large format presses producing a wide variety of products today. While the automation has made them the competitive leader locally, they have also expanded and are now competing in larger markets outside their local region with increasing success. They currently employ over 30 people locally as well as 6 people in India who do both website programming as well as production.
According to Shawn, finding and implementing Ultimate Impostrip® was “one of the most important components of their production system”.
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Fast . Good . Cheap
That about sums up PrintPapa. Your number one source for Short Run Printing (from 10 to 10000). High quality work, low minimums & fast turnarounds are what we do best! Everything your business needs like brochures, flyers, business cards, vinyl banners, window clings, posters, signage, presentation folders, booklets & more! PrintPapa can take care of all your printing needs, just log on to PrintPapa.com and place your order online.
Our goal is to provide the best service at the best price in the fastest time and we strive daily to achieve that goal. PrintPapa has what it takes to turn a printer into your partner, and we have been doing it successfully since 2004. Through our service, quality & innovation we are able to achieve our goal of 100% customer satisfaction and retention. Fast turnaround times, the highest quality product and superior customer service keep PrintPapa a cut above the rest.
www.printpapa.com