Las Vegas Commercial Printer Expects To Hit The Jackpot With First Digital Product: A Xerox High-End Color Press

Graphics West says Xerox marketing, business support were key differentiators

LAS VEGAS and ROCHESTER, N.Y., Jan. 12, 2006 -- Graphics West has added digital printing into its business for the first time with a Xerox Corporation (NYSE: XRX) DocuColor™ 8000 Digital Press.
This will enable the firm, part of Nationwide Graphics/Premier Print - a printing network of 16 commercial print companies across the United States - to produce short-run, full-color jobs and to profit in new markets where they couldn’t before with offset printing.

The commercial printer expects to grow its business with a core of local hospitality and gaming customers and to expand into new industries such as real estate and healthcare, both booming Las Vegas markets. With its new digital print capabilities, Graphics West can now offer cost-effective print on-demand and personalized print jobs.

“We need to break away from price per piece and use digital to enable us to help increase revenue for our clients,” said Jere Ames-Johnson, president, Graphics West.

After researching competitive products, the company selected the DocuColor 8000 for its image quality. Also, as print volumes grow, the DocuColor 8000 provides an easy migration path to systems like the Xerox iGen3™ 110 Digital Production Press. In addition to the DocuColor 8000, Graphics West operates several pieces of traditional offset equipment. According to Ames-Johnson, offering complementary printing technology will help grow both parts of the business.

“Each product and each creative idea requires different production capabilities - now we’re able to meet any customer need,” he said.

Xerox’s ProfitAccelerator™ Digital Business Resources - a comprehensive package of business development tools - was a key reason the company decided to choose Xerox. “You need support beyond the box. You can have the best production capabilities, but it’s the marketing and business support that is vital. What Xerox offers is a key differentiator among the competition,” said Ames-Johnson.

Among the resources Graphics West will use are kits dealing with vertical markets, providing customers with samples and source files to create personalized applications, and support to help re-engineer its sales approach. According to Ames-Johnson, “we have traditionally been selling ink on paper, but with digital printing we will now be selling value and solutions to help our clients.”

Graphics West successfully used Xerox’s ProfitQuick™, a financial tool in the ProfitAccelerator package, to help the company assess the return on investment with digital technology.

The commercial printer expects to produce a range of personalized applications including brochures, posters, postcards and more complex one-to-one marketing campaigns. And the company secured business from several new customers days after installing the Xerox digital press. For example, a hospitality/gaming prospect asked Graphics West to produce a job that combined static offset printing with customized, digitally produced materials.

Graphics West also developed a proposal for another potential gaming client that currently produces static “players’ club” mailers that typically receive a 1 percent response rate. The company indicated it could generate significantly higher ROI by producing the mailers digitally - and customizing the content to each individual recipient. Graphics West expects to win the business, which will help significantly grow print volume.

“Las Vegas is very unique - a lot of companies wait until the last minute to ramp up marketing efforts, so it’s always a challenge to meet their needs,” said Ames-Johnson. “The fast turnaround from digital printing will help us meet those challenges.”

About Graphics West
Graphics West has been providing high quality prepress, printing, and special finishing services to the casino and other industries since 1977. The company operates out of a 43,000-square-foot facility and is a complete printing/graphic resource to the Nevada, Arizona, and California regions. The Nationwide Graphics/Premier Print network employs more than 1,000 people across the country.

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Neil Fagenbaum

Media Contact

Xerox Corporation

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