Blown by the wind…

Friday thoughts about the global printing community and the demand for a radical change

I totally agree to the thoughts Morten B. Reitoft shared on INKISH.News. Key statement: "Tradeshows can't be the centre of product launches anymore." And drupa as the #1 is no exception.

In fact all of us are not happy about that development. Starting 1977 I joined drupa trade shows at least 10 times (!) so far. But going back in my memory, the way drupa was designed since 2004 it becomes clear: It wasn't about the visitors anymore. It was a more or less selfish approach to fulfill mainly the needs of exhibitors and the organizers. As a result, #empathy and #sympathy for the visitors have been left behind.

So sorry to say, but the global print community lost its home base. And in a certain way a part of its identity as well.

BTW: I don't think that #drupa2020 couldn't postponed without accepting that plus a radical change. Not because of #cornacrisis. Because of the fact that the #future of #print is driven by #humans.

My Take

To be able for a disruptive change you should rethink all your tasks and eliminated bull shit:

1. What is the value of a generic claim like „Embrace the future“? Specially in a situation where all of us have to „Embrace the chaos“ to survive.

2. Why presenting survey results of the 3rd drupa Global Trend Spotlight Report created some time before #coronacrisis and publish them now, in May, 2020? And interviewing 500 printers plus 200 suppliers is NOT representative as professional market research experts could verify.

3. That leads us to a core problem for the global print community: We don’t have reliable, valid facts about markets, segments, applications, trends, customer experiences or even failures. Because all involved invent their own definition of the so-called ‚print industry’.

4. ”Embrace the chaos 2.0“: The market volume in the sense of global total value creation with private media is sometimes given as € 400 billion or € 1,000 billion or even over € 2,460 billion. What should you believe now? And what do outsiders, analysts, investors, politicians, and at least customers of print shops think of such a broken picture?

5. Ultimately, it's not about optimism of purpose, it's about changing consciousness driven by clarity, a string sense of reality and confidence.

My advice: we should push the re-start button. All together!

May 01, 2020

Author: Andreas Weber, Head of Restart