Downturn – the word has been on a lot of people’s lips, on everyone’s mind and definitely on many companies’ bottom line. The worldwide economic woes started as a credit crunch that turned into a GFC, all held together by the eight-letter word ‘downturn’ – blamed for many of the world’s problem from companies shutting up shop to entire countries going bust, from hungry presses to famine in developing nations.
The print industry has been on the frontline of economic crisis. Falling volumes, crumbling margins, evaporating credit lines. Some pundits have estimated the loss of print volumes at around 20-25% in the past two years -a staggering drop in work over such a short space of time.
It has been bad everywhere. Australia may have been the lucky country as the only G20 nation that, technically, didn’t dip into recession but the downturn made its mark on local shores, and took its pound of flesh.
Our economy as a whole may have escaped the full force of the financial storm, but the print industry wears the scars.
Things seem to be turning a corner. Economies across the world are tentatively talking about recovery. Marketing budgets are forecast to be on the up in 2010 – generally a sure sign that at least some volume will be on its way back.
But although growth will return, the damage dealt by the downturn will be with us for a long time to come. Headlines about print companies closing their doors and printers out of work continue to dominate the news.
We all know times have been tough, but how tough? What has been the real impact of the downturn? How did Aussie printers fare against the inclement weather? Who found ways to batten the hatches against the storm and who was swept away in an economic hurricane? ProPrint wanted to find out. Over the past three months, we have surveyed hundreds of print companies across the country, to find out the true cost of the downturn.
Click on the below links to read the report
1. Survey introduction and who responded
4. Offset versus digital in the downturn
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