Greg Grace, LIA Fellow, gives high praise to the training regimen of the Sydney packaging printer at the Sydney Graduate of the Year awards.
“It’s a credit to the training practices of the company that two of its apprentices made it to the final. It says a lot about the quality of the management,” said Grace.
The two, James Wesley, prepress and Mitchell Brennan, litho printer, were among six graduates chosen as the best apprentices of the year. In the event, Carl Weeks, a web litho printer from Hannanprint was the winner, going forward to represent NSW at the bi-annual Heidelberg LIA graduate of the Year.
A good turnout for the awards reinforced the enduring engagement of the industry with the LIA. According to Mitchell Mulligan, Bottcher managing director and perennial master of ceremonies, the LIA is the industry partner for graduates. “We take up where the schools leave off,” he said.
Sam Moss, the previous LIA Heidelberg graduate spoke briefly to thank the Association for his “life-changing event” of being named last year’s winner. Among his rewards was a trip to this year’s Ipex trade show in London in May.
Guest speaker, Kellie Northwood, director of print advocacy organisation, Two Sides, made an impassioned plea for more printers to sign up to the ‘push back’ movement, citing numerous statistics to prove that print was not only sustainable, but is on track to actually be carbon positive.
“We deal in myths and facts, presenting facts to dispel the myths about the bad impact of printing,” she said.
She urged printers to be more proactive in presenting the benefits of printing as a marketing medium, citing one major retailer who spends over $100 million a year complaining that while online providers overwhelm him with statistics, he never hears from printers about the effectiveness of print. “This is despite catalogues being the single most effective marketing medium,” she said.
This year’s finalists at the awards were:
- Carl Week, web litho Hannanprint
- Corey Morse, screen printing – Print Hutt
- David Purtell, web litho – Rural Press
- James Wesley, graphic prepress – Hannapak
- Mitchell Brennan, sheet litho – Hannapak
- Tory Kelso, print finishing – Focus Press.
Reflecting the recent turmoil of the industry, finalist Troy Kelso faced an uncertain future, despite being a highly skilled graduate. The company he worked for, Focus Press went spectacularly broke costing scores of jobs. However, Tory was one of the lucky ones, being taken up by Mark Shergill’s new Focus Print Group to continue his employment.
[imagebrowser id=31]