{ Originally posted March 13, 2009 }
If you're interested in my blabla or my 2¢ you can find me at @ToughLoveforX
I'm now focused on Print in the Communications Ecology.
Yesterday I got an email from an on the ground printer in the States.
She said:
I had been wondering about the lack of input from you lately (you used to be EVERYWHERE!) – glad to be getting your tweets!
I said:
Thanks for the email. "EVERYWHERE?" yikes! Can you imagine what is was like back in the day working with me. I never shut up.
A short explanation about the blog . From where I sit, I really do think the "tipping point" has been reached in Print and from here on in, much less panic and much more money. Hooray!
But it's a bit less interesting as the pieces fall back into place. My real passion as you might be able to tell from my tweets is education. Primarily in the creation of at risk kids in really broken high schools. As an example the average grad rate in NYC is 63% and people look upon that as a great victory.
The thing about education is NOT about feel good. It's about making money for printers who get it. Marketing for globals is a loser because the margins are so low and will continue to be so low. At the local level there's more opp, but with the competition from on line and the chains - Alpha, Staples, etc. the margins are going to stay tight.
Right now there is a huge amount of money being poured into education. Also a huge disruption is going on in that market that opens up opportunities for smaller, faster, smarter printers.
Lots of commercial people think I'm all about the feel good. Suffice it to say that one of the reasons I was able to retire was by investing in print related companies. Just as examples, in the last year Consolidated is up 125%, McClatchey newspapers up 800%, Gannett up 300%, Oce up around 100%. When I say print ain't dead, my data points are the stock prices.
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Good looking blog - great content, as always.
ReplyDeleteKeep it up -
Education and Politics - huh.
OK - domestically, what is the administrator to teacher ratio?
And when you say "money is pouring in..." you are referring to tax revenues, correct?
I admire your focus on broken schools - and haven't we been focusing on broken schools since the late 60's?
Can you see an ROI?
Here's what I think I see.
ReplyDelete1. Textbooks are toast. Once California and Texas break ranks the rest will follow.
2. The Obama is not fooling around with Duncan. They fired 93 teachers in one day In Rhode Island, the strongest Union Town in the States.
3. The States are broke and will stay broke for awhile. Lots of them are starting 4 day weeks.
4. The game changers are in the High School drop out factories. Everything else is good enuff for now. But you can't keep graduating less than 50% and stay in business.
So.. the opp is in MPS! WEb connected MFP's delivering `1 page study guides with Human Readable URLs and QR codes for snazz... I got a lot longer but pretty boring story...
Just say more or tell me what I'm missing and we'll go from there.
So I forget the secret sauce --it's a profitable service when you're selling MPS and boxes into ed.
ReplyDeleteThat way you get on the educator side of the budget... and basically can tell the IT people to kiss off.
Thanks for this post The thing about education is NOT about feel good. It's about making money for printers who get it.
ReplyDelete