Wide Format Imaging

The International Reprographic Association must be meaningful to everyone in the individual segments of the industry, says Mike Carter, new board president of the International Reprographic Association.

As the 75th IRgA board president, he says one of his jobs is to brand the organization as digital-savvy and experts in the reprographic field. Another: Keep cohesion of an organization with multiple segments.

"I would like to see that at the end of the year, we've made steps in the direction so our clients identify us a partner and the industry is still a unified industry," Carter said.

The digital reprographic world will continue to challenge the industry, he says, especially when it comes to payment for services. Such aspects of digital production in planrooms are something he understands well as president and chief operating officer for Lynn Imaging, Lexington and Louisville, KY, which uses and owns eDistribution planroom software.

"The challenge is that our industry is changing to more digital and we need to stay on top of it and know how to charge for those digital services," Carter said. "We're being asked to provide services to clients and we're not used to charging for those."

Here is a summary of Carter's thoughts about topics in the industry:

Charging for digital services:
Converting square-foot prices for paper to digital fees is a challenge. Such a conversion does not necessarily mean less paper?just reimbursement for digital services. "We have to continue to be paid for our time and effort in a different way," Carter said, "so everybody is having to adjust in making sure that they have their proper profits in time spent charging for these digital services."

The IRgA has had numerous seminars on the topic, which Carter says is an appropriate role for the association.