Getting it back

Getting it back

Steve Delaney lost a lucrative book-printing deal a year ago to low-cost Chinese competitors, but he won it back when the Olympics disrupted business there. The deal shows how American businesses can take advantage of the perils of offshoring.

Score one for the home team.

As China shut down its paper mills for the Olympics, a Fort Myers physician became worried that his Chinese printing company wouldn't be able to meet the deadline to publish a medical textbook in time for classes this fall.

That's when Steve Delaney, president of commercial printer Direct Impressions, scored the $100,000 contract to print the textbook. "He wasn't getting any answers out of his printer," Delaney says. "It was a bad sign."

Call it a lesson in the risks and opportunities of offshoring. Delaney, whose Cape Coral-based printing company had lost the medical-textbook contract to the low-cost Chinese a year ago, won it back because of reliability and speed. "They shut down right through the Olympics," Delaney says.

Now, the book's author is reconsidering whether to print the book in China at all. Of course, Delaney won't identify the doctor or the name of the book for competitive reasons. "It's mandatory reading for medical students," Delaney says. "That's his niche."

A year ago, Delaney had given the doctor a quote to publish the 368-page multi-color textbook, but at $6.25 per book it was $2.25 more than his Chinese competitors even with shipping costs included. "The price he was paying was what I'd have to pay for paper," Delaney says.

Then, the Olympics loomed and the doctor couldn't get assurances from the Chinese that the book would be printed and shipped in time for fall classes. The doctor couldn't afford to miss the deadline because medical schools might select competing books instead, costing him business. "He really had no choice," Delaney says.

Direct Impressions had been printing brochures for the doctor. "I gave him the best deal I could," he says. Ironically, Delaney printed the book using paper made in China.

Delaney printed 15,000 copies using a new high-speed Heidelberg press in just over two weeks. "We've spent a lot of money on the latest technology," Delaney says. Besides books and brochures, Direct Impressions prints magazines such as the Red Sox spring training program. The company has been in business 20 years, starting as a direct-mail printer.

Because of shipping, it would have taken the Chinese printer three times as long to deliver the books. Despite the higher costs, the doctor's book is still highly profitable and Delaney says the physician is reconsidering whether to continue printing it in China. "He's indicated he's extremely happy what we did for him," he says.

Since he landed the contract in June, Delaney has been scouting other opportunities to take business away from the Chinese. That information is hard to find and so far he hasn't had luck finding new customers. But the exercise proves that trade isn't necessarily a one-way trip.

-Jean Gruss