Are you training your customers?
Take Time to Train Your Customers
Yes, I know you are a sign and print shop. So what does training have to do with your shop? Actually a lot!
Look, you have your way of doing things right? Maybe you need a minimum resolution for image printing, maybe its a size, and just maybe your customer doesn’t even know what else you can do for them!
Training them!
Show Them What You Do!
Why not give your customer a tour of your shop? Show them what you do….everything! Tell them how it’s done. Teach them, almost, how to do it. They will walk away with a greater appreciation of your skills and maybe even see why you have to charge them your prices!
Print & Cut
Most customers have never seen how you make a decal by printing and then cutting it. Have a sample ready and then customize it for your “training”. Actually what you are making is a custom sample that they can take home and then come back and order more!
Window Graphics
Lot’s of customers love window graphics either for personal use or in their business. If you know a customer is coming into your shop to pick up an order, have a great sample ready for them and show them how to apply it. They will love it!
Eye Glass Cleaner
If you’ve got a dye-sublimation setup, make some eye glass cleaners and give them away to everyone, but not before you show them how you made them! They will really appreciate and begin asking questions about what else you can do.
Training Keeps Customers
In these days of intense competition, training can keep that customer coming back to you. Who knows you might even find a great employee! LOL!
MUTOH AMERICA is a great source for wide format print equipment as well as training and education on how to use that equipment. For more information visit our mother ship at www.mutoh.com.
Wide Format Printing Open House!
Mac Papers Announces June 27 Grand Opening of New Wide Format Demo Center in Nashville Area
Grand opening showcases educational seminars and wide format printing and finishing equipment demonstrations from leading manufacturers Roland DGA, Mutoh, and more
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (June 25, 2018) – Mac Papers, one of the largest merchant distributors in the Southeast U.S., announced today the June 27 grand opening of its newest wide format demo center. Located at the Mac Papers Nashville branch, the center showcases the latest wide format printing and finishing technologies from best-in-class equipment manufacturers including Roland DGA, Mutoh America Inc., Canon Solutions America, Geo Knight & Co, and Printware.
“We’re extremely pleased to offer our customers a fourth location in the Southeast where they can get hands-on wide format equipment and media experience and training,” said Marty Davis, director of wide format and graphics for Mac Papers. “The grand opening of our Nashville demo center will feature demonstrations of the latest equipment as well as complimentary seminars, including two excellent sessions from wide format sign and graphics expert Mark Rugen of Mutoh.”
Davis will lead a lunch seminar on dye sublimation techniques and trends, and members of the Mac Papers wide format technical team will be present to demonstrate equipment and recommend media from top manufacturers including Neenah Coldenhove, General Formulations and Avery Dennison.
“Mac Papers is committed to helping commercial printers and sign and display businesses excel in the growing wide format segment,” added Davis. “As part of that ongoing commitment, Mac Papers plans to operate a demo center within a four-hour drive of all the areas we serve throughout the southeastern U.S.”
To RSVP for the June 27 event, go to macpapers.com/nashvilledemo. The new demo center is located at 5501 Crossing Circle, Antioch, Tennessee. Mac Papers also operates wide format demo centers in Atlanta, Jacksonville and Orlando. The centers are open for appointments Monday through Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. To schedule a visit and demonstration, call 844.MAC.WIDE (844.622.9433), or email wideformat@macpapers.com.
About Mac Papers
Headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, Mac Papers is one of the largest wholesale distributors in the southeastern U.S. The company is a distribution partner for paper and print, packaging, facility supplies and office products. Mac Papers works with best-in-class suppliers to help businesses and consumers deliver quality results, boost efficiency and improve their bottom line. The company operates branch locations and retail stores in nine states across the Southeast. Mac Papers is a third generation, family-owned and operated business founded in 1965. Our sister company Mac Papers Envelope Converters converts and prints an extensive range of standard and custom envelopes – 16 million per day – utilizing the latest in equipment and technology. For more information, please visit macpapers.com or follow us on Twitter @macpapers and LinkedIn.
Media contact: John Herbkersman; John.Herbkersman@macpapers.com; 904.348.3237
Read MoreMac Papers to Host Open House with Guest MUTOH FlexiSIGN & Print Expert Mark Rugen
A Different Kind of Open House by Mac Papers
Mac Papers will host an educational based open house at their new wide format demo center on June 27 in Nashville, TN.
This is not just a product showcase, but rather an educational event. They have invited Mark Rugen, Dir. Product Marketing & Education at MUTOH AMERICA to share his expertise by leading two educational seminars.
Mark is not only a MUTOH Valuejet wide format printer expert, he is an expert in color management as well as FlexiSIGN & Print. Mark has been in the wide format sign & graphics business for over 30 years! Every MUTOH Valuejet printer comes with a free copy of FlexiSIGN, a $4000 value and Mark will give two one hour sessions on this design & production software.
His topics will include:
Top 10 features of FlexiSIGN for Wide Format Printing
- Using the Cloud Features – What Are They and Why You Need Them
- Custom Workspaces – Setting Up a Faster Interface
- Right Mouse Button – Saving Time Searching for Commands
- DesignCentral – The Heart of Flexi
- Fill/Stroke Editor – Manage Color Effects
- Smart Objects – Make Editing Easy
- Text & Graphic Styles – Create, Save & Repeat
- Vectorizing – The Best of Flexi & More
- Contour Cutting – Making It Easy with MUTOH
- Production Manager – So Much More Than a RIP
Getting the Best Color You Ever Printed
- Color Setting – The Heart of Color Management
- Soft Proofing – See Before You Print
- Working with Vector Color
- Working with Bitmaps
- Adobe & Flexi – Let’s Play Nice!
In addition to Marks presentation, there is a Mutoh ValueJet 1638WX on site for demos and the Mac Papers staff members and others will discuss dye-sublimation equipment and methods to show you how to get started and be successful in a growing industry.
This is not just a product showcase, but rather an educational event.
Of course, there will be plenty of time to ask a question of the experts present as well as get some personal attention regarding how to get the best prints on a wide format printer. So come to visit with some of the best-known industry experts and have some fun too!
For More Information About This Educational Open House and to register to attend, visit https://www.macpapers.com/nashvilledemo/
Marty Davis
Director, Wide Format and Graphics
3300 Philips Highway
Jacksonville, FL 32207
904-348-3302 (office)
813-965-1925 (cell)
Can’t Attend? Watch this sample of what you’ll be missing and be sure to visit our www.thinkmutoh.com website for online training!
Read More
FlexiSIGN Training DVD ON SALE Until June 30
Get the FlexiSIGN Training DVD for Half Off!
MUTOH is offering Mark Rugen’ 10-hour FlexiSIGN Training DVD for 50% off in the month of June! That’s a savings of $150.
Use this link to order your personal copy: https://www.thinkmutoh.com/product/flexisigntrainingdownload
The training sessions are broken down into several sections:
- Introduction (6 videos)
- Fundamentals (23 videos)
- Intermediate (10 videos)
- Advanced (17 videos)
- Production Manager Topics (3 videos)
- Color Management Topics (6 videos)
- Third-Party Programs (4 videos)
- Bonus Topics (6 videos)
- Flexi 12 Training (9 videos)
A partial list of lessons available include:
- Text Basics
- Outlines & Shadows
- Importing
- Scanning, Bitmaps
- Bitmap Tracing
- Vinyl Cutting
- Printing
- Contour Cutting
- Lenses
- Vehicle Wraps
- And much more!
Our Flexi 11 & 12 Training offers a simplified approach to cutting-edge technology.
https://www.thinkmutoh.com/product/flexisigntrainingdownload
Mark Rugen has over 30years of experience in the graphics and signs business. He is one of the few SAi certified Flexi Trainers in the world. He has authored and produced interactive training for resellers, SAi inside sales staff, and end users. He has conducted training sessions worldwide and to date has trained well over 10,000 students.
Read MoreA PC Tech’s PC Tech – Why Consider A Fast Computer from SignBurst
Hi, my name is Earl
One of the funniest things about the show “My Name is Earl” is that he never took a photo where his eyes weren’t shut.
This seemed fitting in talking about another of my industry friends. Let me introduce you to a guy who opened my eyes to optimized PCs for the design and sign industry.
Casey Yonemura, the Graphic Design Computer Specialist at Signburst (http://signburst.com/).
Casey was working the SAI booth https://www.thinksai.com/) at ISA 2018.
The first time I met Casey was at a trade show, many years ago.
Mutoh was just focusing on car wraps and I had actually begun designing wraps for myself and Mutoh.
Mutoh is an industry leader in the car wrap field now and Mutoh sponsors Justin Pate’s Avery Wrap Classes around the country. (https://www.mutoh.com/company/events/)
Justin’s an old friend of mine and I like to think I helped get these training classes off the ground in the early days. (http://www.justinpate.net/)
What a Great Computer Can Do
So I was at a show and stopped by The Bad Wrap booth (https://thebadwrap.com/) where Casey was running a Photoshop demo using The Bad Wrap templates and full-size wrap designs.
It looked like a typical canned video commercial with images dragging in and being edited and popping up in the template. assumed this was all edited to look fast, because I had a pretty good PC at home and I knew my images took much, MUCH longer just to load, more to edit. was just about to keep walking when I overheard the conversation between Casey and the guy he was giving a demo to about loading another image, and I watched Casey load a full-size image into the template with a click of the mouse.
This was REAL TIME.
I had never seen anything quite like this.
And this was BEFORE SSDs and the like.
Yes, I built dozens of PCs over the years and thought I had pretty good insight on PCs, but nothing like Casey has. Stayed and watched the rest of his demo and quizzed him on how he was able to get this kind of performance out of a PC.
It boiled down to the ‘right’ quality components and his insights from contacts at Adobe and RIP companies that allowed him to optimize these PCs not only for design but for RIP performance as well.
What a Great Computer Can Do in Your Shop
I was impressed enough to do a testimonial for Casey:
Randy Anderson, Product Marketing Manager – Mutoh America Inc. – “I have to admit, when I first saw one of Signburst’s computers running Photoshop for vehicle wrap design at a trade show, I thought there was some trickery going on. I had never seen such large files open and process so quickly. I watched for about 20 minutes in awe as this system was working virtually in real time with huge files and many layers. We invited SignBurst to our demo room, and their computer RIP’ed files in seconds that took our in-house system minutes, truly impressive. The time savings and increased productivity for these systems can greatly benefit any production environment.”
His PCs are blazing fast, and can increase your productivity and Casey is a PC Tech’s PC Tech. Pair his computers with our already fast MUTOH printers and you just entered the good side of the Twilight Zone!
Read MoreDo You Need FlexiSIGN Training?
Just like physical training for the body, training for your business can add muscle to your profits! MUTOH ValueJet wide format printers come with FlexiSIGN and many shops use FlexiSIGN & Print in their shops for design and production of wide format printing.
FlexiSIGN Training from the Expert
Like physical training, sometimes you need a coach and the better your coach the better your results! Mark Rugen, Dir. of Product Marketing & Education for MUTOH AMERICA is the world’s expert in FlexiSIGN training. When he came to MUTOH, he decided that users of FlexiSIGN needed more than just software training. He decided he needed to share his 30 years of real-world shop experience in the sign and graphics market.
Wide Format Printing Workflows
Wide format printing workflows are critical for greater profits. You’ve invested thousands in a wide format printer, you need to pay that investment off and you
may also need to make a steady income to support the growth of your company as well as sustain the income of your employees. Doesn’t it make sense to be the best you can be with your design and production software?
Think about it. The typical flow in your shop is, find a customer or have one walk into your shop. They want a message and maybe a graphic along with it. Now they want that enlarged, put on a banner or some other substrate and they would like to have it in the afternoon or the next day! How fast could you get this done is they bring you a low-resolution image about 2×2 inches and want it printed 2×2 feet? What is they want you to use the same font in a photo they are showing you? Could you find that font in few seconds or would it take you minutes or hours? What if they said you just have to match a certain Pantone color? Could you do this with ease?
MUTOH Training is Different
MUTOH training is different because we are not only going to teach you about FlexiSIGN & Print, or about your MUTOH or another printer (you should have bought a ValueJet, LOL) and color management, but we are going to show you how to save media, how to match colors, how to get the job done in record time with other tools I’ve used in my 30 years in the business. MUTOH training is a real world, real shop training not some powerpoint presentation.
What Other Are Saying About MUTOH Training
Don’t take my word for it! Here are just a few examples of what graduates of the MUTOH training series are saying:
“Mark truly understands the program from the inside out. He explains efficiently the strengths of the program along with its limitations.” Jeff Fredwich – SIGNARAMA Willow Grove
“Learned a lot that I thought I already knew.” Akhay Putri – Avery Dennison
“Best software training class I have EVER attended!” – Adrienne Latiolias, AWA Printing
“Mark explains things in an easy to understand way for beginners!” Josh Munn, Munn Enterprises, Inc.
Your Next Step….INVEST!
Look, it’s time to get even better at your job. It’s time to take the small step of investing in a MUTOH FlexiSIGN training seminar. Here’s a link to find out where we will be. I only have a few seats left in BOSTON on June 6,7. Just do it!
BOSTON June 6,7 https://www.thinkmutoh.com/event/flexisign-workshop-boston-ma-june-6-7-2018/?v=e748b7c8fd06
Los Angeles August 15,16 https://www.thinkmutoh.com/event/flexisign-workshop-los-angeles-ca-august-15-16-2018/?v=e748b7c8fd06
Phoenix Sept 5,6 https://www.thinkmutoh.com/event/flexisign-workshop-los-angeles-ca-august-15-16-2018/?v=e748b7c8fd06
Got questions? Just email me: mrugen@mutoh.com
BONUS!
Look I know its a lot to ask for you to take a few days away from your shop. I owned a shop I really do know its tough! So to sweeten the offer, I am giving away a FlexiSIGN Training DVD to everyone that attends. That’s a $299 value and its loaded with over 20 hours of FLexiSIGn training to augment your live class!
I’ve also got some really cool secret stuff that only graduates of the MUTOH FlexiSIGN and Color Management training class receive, plus you gain access to our exclusive FlexiSIGN Training Graduates Facebook page where you’ll be able to interact with hundreds of other FlexiSIGN graduates and get the expert help you need in the future!
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Our goal is to offer the best training & education to the wide format printing market in the world. Here you will find information, training & education from experts in the wide format printing business as well as videos and other methods of learning. Please feel free to send us your ideas and suggestions to make this your one place to find answers, tips and more to help your business succeed.
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Think MUTOH live and online courses are designed for the graphics professional in the wide format printing market. Whether you are new to the business or have decades of experience, our courses are designed to assist you in fine tuning your workflow for a more efficient shop.
Our Professional Instructors
MUTOH educational courses are lead by only the best and most experienced of instructors. Our instructors have decades of experience in the wide format print industry and are recognized as leading professionals with practical experience.
Mark Rugen – Director of Education
Director of Product Marketing & Education
Students Testimonials
We are not just bragging here! Let some of our former students and graduates speak for themselves!
(Not actual student photos)
Recent Posts
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- How to Prepare for and Get Great Technical Support
Recent Posts
- MUTOH Offers an Online Product Catalog of Award Winning Printers
- MUTOH America Heats Up the Printing Industry with its Launch of the New XpertJet 1682SR Pro Dual Head Eco-Solvent Wide Format Printer
- Free VerteLith Print Environments Webinar December 15th – Everyone Welcome
- If You Print Vehicle Wraps You Have to See The #1 “Wrappers Choice” Printer from MUTOH
- How to Prepare for and Get Great Technical Support