During the past weeks, SG360° has often been mentioned in the trade media. Not only is it a great company, but they are also the launch customer of the new HP PageWide Advantage 2200 Inkjet printer. I would lie if I weren't hoping to see the Advantage when we visited SG360° lately. But, SG360° is a large company with about 1500 employees working in six different locations, and the Wheeling location we visited didn't happen to be that (there are two in Wheeling). However, it was a great visit, regardless.

By Editor Morten B. Reitoft

In 1956, Hal Segerdahl and Joseph Halford - both printers - established the Segerdahl Halford Company, and I was just about to say the rest is history, but nothing is 'just' history. The growth was incredible, and as Direct Mail became more and more popular, so did the Segerdahl Halford Company. The company DID, however, started as a Commercial Printing company, so Direct Mailing came later! The strategy served the company well, and the company grew through hard work, organic growth, and acquisitions throughout the '80s.

In 1972 Earl Segerdahl took over the title as CEO after Halford chose to retire, and the company changed its name to Segerdahl Corp. The growth continued.

Nineteen years ago, in 2003, Segerdahl was sold to its employees, and Rick Joutras took over the management. He had a lengthy background in the industry when he took over the position, and worth mentioning that he was Executive Vice President of Columbia Graphics Corporation, which Segerdahl acquired in 2002, just a year before Segerdahl became an employee-owned company.

In 2012, the company changed its name to SG360°. A name that commits as it indicates a forward-looking 360 degrees outlook, and the SG as a direct path back to the founder Segerdahl and the Segerdahl Group.

SG360° has developed software and services that help its clients to communicate with individual customers on a personal level. Looking at the SG360°s website, you see how diverse SG360° is. The company offers true Omni-channel communication from podcasts and film/TV to individually printed postcards, Direct Mailers, or whatever type of printed communication (magazines, leaflets, flyers, etc.) that compliments SG360° customer's needs.

When INKISH visited SG360°, we were met by two very open-minded and friendly people, Marketing Coordinator Marie Ko and Director of Digital Operation John Zawisza. John Zawisza hosted a guided tour, which led us through one of the six sites SG360° operates today. At the Wheeling site, we see four Komori offset presses. All are using UV curing, not only for speed but also because SG360° offer comprehensive varnishes. The 8-color Komori is a straight press with two varnishing units, and the samples you will see in our film from SG360° are stunning. John Zawisza is very satisfied with the collaboration with Komori and the performance of the presses. The four machines are all B1 format (40"). Next to the offset hall, we enter the first of three digital halls. The first room contains the cut-sheet devices SG360° operates from Wheeling, which include multiple HP Indigo machines (7500s and 12Ks). In speaking further with John Zawisza, the current 7500s are traded for two new HP Indigo 100Ks. He ends by saying that he has big expectations for the 100Ks, as these are the machines most people consider to be the best Indigos. Next to the current 7500s, we see two HP Indigo 12000 as excellent workhorses.

I ask him about the well-known issue with colors on heavy substrates, and he says that he believes things are improving. He says that sometimes they don't even use the special bonding agent in the 12Ks anymore - and think it relates to better digital-ready paper from suppliers and better ink/performance on the Indigos.

I find the tour and the chat really exciting as I see and hear the passion of John Zawisza. He knows what he is talking about and the strength and weaknesses of the equipment he utilizes. He also says something fundamental. John's job is to produce what the clients need! This approach is what everybody should do, but I also know from being in the industry for years now, not always happens. John Zawisza is responsible for Digital Production, and I am surprised that he can manage so much equipment with only 20 employees. When we enter the second of the three digital-press rooms, I see a Canon Prostream. The Prostream is long - very long. With SG360°s recent investment in the HP PageWide Advantage 2200, I ask John Zawisza why HP is now entering the SG360° premises with Inkjet when the company already has experience with Canon?

To be honest, John Zawisza is a bit vague on this, and I do understand him. The Advantage is an entirely new device, and though promoted by HP as a game changer, the machine is new. It will get more upgrades/updates before being 100% operative, but the three-dryer configuration and the smaller footprint are, to my understanding, serious KPIs when investing. The speed and the promises the Advantage 2200 will offer SG360° match the requirements SG360° has - high quality and fast. The Advantage 2200, however, beat the Prostream as it can print on thicker substrates.

As you may have realized, I haven't written much about binding, and there is a reason for that. There is a Duplo saddle stitching tower at the Wheeling site, a cutter, and a Morgana scoring/cutting/perforation machine. You do see Hunkeler technology used for winders, unwinders, and cut-stackers, but SG360° also has multiple MBO machines in one of the other sites. Yet another anecdote comes to mind when passing the binding equipment. John Zawisza asks me if I know Rick Salinas from Duplo. John Zawisza tells me that the Duplo stitching tower they have was sold by Rick Salinas - YEARS before he became President of Duplo USA, of course; and fun to see how people stick around in our industry, and suddenly they are presidents :-)

SG360° uses Prinergy for its offset workflow, but John Zawisza realized that digital production requirements were very different years ago. As he already knew about Ultimate Technographics and their Impostrip, he researched and reached out to the Canadian software company. Ultimate Technographics is one of the industry's oldest and most experienced companies regarding imposition and workflow/automation. We have covered more customers using Impostrip, and one of the maybe most difficult challenges about Impostrip is that there is not much to see. The software works in the background and handles complex files enabling printing companies a high level of automation. The files are delivered to hot folders that then structure the jobs, secure the sequence of pages, imposition, and all the necessary data for post-finishing. You may find this easy, but in digital production, where you have many different output devices and a vast number of jobs, sometimes with loads of variable data, this needs to be processed fast and efficiently to utilize the equipment. Ultimate Technographics' Impostrip handles hundreds if not thousands of jobs seamlessly and offers a level of automation that users often forget.

At SG360°, Impostrip plays an immense role, and John Zawisza believes that Impostrip and Ultimate Technographics will have an even further part in the future with SG360°. Though SG360°’s core competency is direct mail, a lot of offset production is needed for pre-printed materials. It will be exciting to see if the future will move some of these offset jobs to digital.

It was genuinely great visiting SG360°, and you will soon be able to see the film we made from there, so you can look at what happens in a suburb of Chicago. Thanks for the opportunity to both SG360° (of course) and Ultimate Technographics for sponsoring the trip!