R. R. Donnelly buys JournalismOnline and its Press+ metered paid content model

U.S. printing giant R. R. Donnelly has made a strategic move by buying JournalismOnline's content project and, with it, the Press+ technology that allows publishers to create flexible pay models for digital content, according to a story in minonline. Stephen Brill, who had founded American Lawyer and Court TV and later Brill's Content before founding JournalismOnline, has been a champion of

St. Joe's Tony Gagliano named printer of the year

St. Joseph Communications president Tony Gagliano has been named printer of the year by the magazine Graphic Monthly Canada, an award that will be presented Saturday, November 20 during the PrintWorld show at the Direct Energy Centre in Toronto. PrintWorld is a trade show owned and managed by North Island Publishing, which publishes Graphic Monthly, Masthead and Design Edge Canada.Gagliano heads

EnRoute will have to be printed elsewhere, as Transcon shuts down Boucherville plant

Boucherville R.I.P.
Transcontinental Inc., Canada's largest consumer magazine publisher and one of the continent's largest printers, is closing its Boucherville, Quebec printing plant, one of 36 it has across the country. The plant, where enRoute magazine is printed for Spafax Inc. on behalf of Air Canada, is but the latest casualty in a restructuring of the company and an overcapacity in

Quad/Graphics shifting magazine printing from Edmonton to Aurora

Quad/Graphics, which bought printer Worldcolor (formerly Quebecor World),  has announced it is consolidating operations, closing a plant in Quebec and shifting its magazine printing business from Edmonton to its huge plant in Aurora, Ontario. According to a company release, about $23 million will be invested in new plant and equipment next year. The St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu plant in Quebec, a

Printers' association hopes to change Heritage's mind about allowing printing outside of Canada

The president of the Canadian Printing Industries Association says he hopes to convince the Department of Canadian Heritage to change the Canada Periodical Fund to prevent public money from being spent to print magazines outside of Canada. Bob Elliott says in a story on the PrintCan website that he is disappointed publishers are no longer required to print their magazines or newspapers in Canada

Publishers' outsourcing of pre-press steadily growing

It would seem that magazine publishers, at least in the U.S. (and probably in Canada) are moving steadily away from doing all of their own pre-press in-house. According to Folio: magazine's 2010 manufacturing and production trends research, the number of publishers doing it all themselves was 60% last year and only 51% this year. Complete outsourcing has stayed steady at about 17% of publishers.

Worldcolor to launch integrated print-on-demand system

Worldcolor has announced a partnership with Kodak and Muller Martini to create a digital inkjet publishing system  that can produce up to 1,000 books an hour and could well become a print-on-demand solution for magazines and back issues. The FastBook digital system integrates and automates prepress, digital printing and finishing in-line to achieve a seamless files-in/books-out solution. While it

Will cheaper paper mean that National Geographic magazines will crumble?

A relatively recent switch by National Geographic magazine to print its inside pages on much less costly coated groundwood paper may mean that, in future, copies will not stand up so well to the test of time. According to a story in the blog Dead Tree Edition, the magazine was previously printed on coated freesheet paper which doesn't contain lignin, a natural ingredient that causes the yellowing

Periodical Fund quietly removes requirement to print funded mags in Canada

There could be a significant impact on Canadian magazine printers from the changing rules under the Canada Periodical Fund, not least of all because the government has quietly dropped the requirement that magazines receiving government funding must be printed in Canada. According to a posting in PrintCan, Doug Bennet, the publisher of industry trade magazines Masthead and Graphic Monthly,

Database tracks phenomenal growth of eco-paper availability

The number of eco-papers available to printers in North America has grown from 97 to 228 in just 18 months, according to information released by Canopy, the  non-profit organization working to improve the environmental performance of paper and wood companies.
"We're witnessing a phenomenal shift in the paper industry where sustained and growing green demand is steering paper production towards

Giant Quad/Graphics Inc. buys Montreal-based Worldcolor Press

[This post has been updated] Quad/Graphics Inc, has agreed to buy magazine printer Worldcolor Press Inc. of Canada, which prints magazines such as Time and Cosmopolitan.The sale price is about $1.3 billion. According to a story published on Bloomberg.com, the merged company, which will be publicly traded, will have 30,000 employees and combined sales of $5.1 billion.

Joel Quadracci, Quad/

Worldcolor consolidates printing plants with loss of 150 jobs

Worldcolor, the former Quebecor World, one of Canada's largest magazine printers, has announced that it is closing its Richmond Hill printing plant and consolidating all magazine, catalogue, direct mail  and production and sales operations to its Aurora plant. The move will be completed by the end of March and will result in a net loss of approximately 150 jobs.

Worldcolor lands contract to print 21 American Bar Asssociation magazines

Worldcolor, the Montreal-based printer (formerly Quebecor World) has landed a contract to print 21 magazines and journals for the American Bar Association. The multi-year pact with ABA Publishing includes such titles as Litigation, Business Law Today, Probate and Property, Student Lawyer and Construction Lawyer. Worldcolor has printed the ABA's flagship magazine ABA Journal for several years.

Rogers and Transcon team up to cut ad insertion lead times to 2 weeks

Canada's two largest magazine publishing companies, Rogers Publishing and Transcontinental Media, have announced that they are cooperating in cutting the lead times for advertisers' insertion in the companies' monthly magazines. Pressexpress is an ad-close schedule that means ad creative can be sumbitted only two weeks prior to publication.Brian Segal, president and CEO of Rogers told Marketing

New logo for former Quebcor World magazine printer

Well, it beats the heck out of "Novink", which was a contender for the renaming of the former Quebecor World magazine printer. World Colour Press of Montreal has introduced its new name and logo, effective immediately. It will be all over the company's website worldcolor.com (note the American spelling).What good is a new logo without a complicated rationale for it? Here is Worldcolor's cour:“

Globe and Mail says its future is to have a magazine look and style

The Globe and Mail will be more like a magazine than a newspaper by late next year as new printing equipment comes online at its primary printer, Transcontinental Inc.What was once the good, grey Globe will become a four-colour newspaper and change its format to fit the new Commander CT presses that Transcon has purchased in order to meet the obligation of its 20-year, $1.7 billion contract

Five ways to green your magazine

Bruce Jensen, group vice president of sales for Transcontinental Printing’s magazine, book & catalogue group, has a brief, commonsensical article for Folio: on "greening" the way magazines do business, written from a printer's perspective.I say common sense, because most publishers may know the following things, but don't always insist on doing them. Use low-volatility inks and coatings and go

From leather to spaghetti, printer offers "peel and sniff" print ads

Scent strips have been ubiquitous in recent years, particularly featuring perfumes in fashion-related magazines, for both men and women. Now, according to a story in Media in Canada, however, magazine printer Quebecor World is rolling out a "peel and sniff" technology called 'Flexappeal' that aims to involve consumers with scented print ads."Certainly peel has been used in the marketplace - a

Quebecor World sees things looking up next year

Quebecor World, the troubled, but still enormous printer, is expecting to emerge from bankruptcy protection and a $1.7 billion loss last year to next year seeing a modest $7 million profit. According to a story in the Globe and Mail, the company, which prints a large number of Canadian magazines, is expecting continued difficulties in volume because of the economic recession, but that cost

Type shop provides print buyers with tools to measure ecological footprint

A Toronto type shop called Colour Innovations has launched a new feature on its website that allows print buyers to measure their ecological footprint, reports Design Edge Canada.Under the Eco Tools button on the site are definitions of numerous environmental terms, links and an FAQ section with important questions to address to your print and premedia suppliers.“We’ve put the information for