Into Print, The University of Iowa Business Services' quarterly newsletter, aims to educate, inform, and entertain its readers, with a goal of fostering positive communication between the departments, their staffs, and their clients.

IN THIS ISSUE
News briefs
Plan to pay more for postage next year
Expect bulk mail rules change in June
College of Business award given to Carolyn Stoddard

TypeStrikes

General news
Regents call for Iowa, ISU, UNI fleet services to merge
Mail magazine cover story features UI-UNI mail partnership
Printing among top 50 in-plants
Copy Centers employee Tim Blake called for active duty in Iraq
Business Services delivery consolidation team receives IOWA award
Business Services marketing administrator to serve on Kirkwood advisory committee
Variety of learning opportunities on tap

Central Mail Services
Pace picks up at Central Mail as departments realize savings
    View photos
Correct address format can't hurt, will help
Central Mail Services offers tabbing, inserting, addressing
Cardboard boxes required for UPS parcels
The right envelopes can help cut mailing costs

Parking and Transportation
Innovative program begins for ride-sharing commuters: Emergency Ride Home
Character counts: Meet Meet Lori Skoff

Printing Department
Variable data printing: use to improve response to your mailings
Save time, money: send keystrokes with your new printing order
Q&A: What is the best way to send a digital file to the Printing Department?
Kinnick Stadium remodeling means marathon work session for Wide Media
    View photos
Use current software updates for best results when working with Printing

Stores and Rental Services
OfficeMax contracted as new UI office supply vendor
Product show draws the expected crowd

The Regents' stated goal is to encourage cost savings. In December 2003 the Board "directed the University Presidents to propose methods to achieve administrative efficiencies and other cost containment measures through enterprise-wide collaboration or the creation of enterprise-wide, non-academic administrative services," according to its report on the topic. The focus for the report was on areas under the vice presidents for finance. The regents specified that the recommendations could include reorganizations, consolidations, outsourcing services, or process improvements.

"We have not had a delay in the two years of the partnership, and what once took them all day to process, we now do in an hour and ten minutes," the article quotes Kula as saying.

See the Summer 2002 issue of Into Print for more information about the UI-UNI mail partnership.

The survey ranks the facilities using several citeria, including sales, number of employees, number of jobs per year, and percent of parent organization's work printed. The Printing Department, established in 1930, had $6.788 million in sales and a staff of 55 full-time and 15 part-time and temporary employees last year.

An in-plant printing facility fulfills primarily the document reproduction needs of its parent organization, whether the focus is business, industry, education, government, or service. A study last year estimated there are more than 50,000 in-plants generating $15.8 billion in revenue in the U.S. About 80 percent of them are small copy and print shops.

Tours
Eye on Iowa - Printing Department tour: Opportune Noon tour of the department's production areas. April 20.
Classes and small groups are welcome to tour the Printing, Mail, and General Stores facilities at the Mossman Building.
Contact Jenean Arnold, marketing administrator, for more information about tours.

Training
MIGS, SIGS: Training for using General Stores' ordering systems is available on request. Contact Judy Rockafellow for more information.

Presentations
Central Mail schedules presentations to provide information and money-saving suggestions specific to departments' mailing needs. Contact Chris Kula for more information.

New staff orientation
Business Services employees participate in the monthly orientation sessions for new faculty and staff. Contact Linda Noble (Parking and Transportation) and Jenean Arnold (other Business Services departments) for more information.

Web-based information
The Business Services departments maintain web sites that provide information and resources.

Refer to the Business Services Directory for staff contact information. Registration for Introduction to General Stores, Producing successful mail pieces, and the Eye on Iowa tour, as well as information about orientation, are handled by the UI Office of Learning and Development.

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Central Mail's volume is up dramatically from January 2004, even as some mailings, such as pay statements, go on line. It's because departments and organizations are discovering this in-house service helps them save time and money. What is the secret?

There isn't one. It is a matter of knowing the ins and outs of the U.S. Postal Service and complying with its requirements. After eighteen years with the USPS, Central Mail manager Chris Kula knows them all and wants to pass the information along to UI mailers.

"I'm extremely pleased with how we've helped departments save money this year," Kula says. Savings have come in different ways. One department had 150,000 send-and-return envelopes that were printed with an outdated delivery return address. Central Mail worked with the Postal Service to forward the mail until the existing supply was used up. The department did not have to dispose of them and print new ones, saving about $4,000.

Others save time and money with automated inserting: a machine can insert 3,000 one-page letters per hour, compared to a manual rate of 300 pieces.

Then there are the savings that come from using correct addresses, applying them by machine, and converting mail from First-Class to bulk. Addressing is a matter of following guidelines and using technology, while converting to bulk mail "mostly involves re-evaluating the type and purpose of the mail you're sending," Kula says.

The Developmental Studies Hybridoma Bank, in the Department of Biological Sciences, enjoyed big savings this way when it came time for its annual bulk mailing of 20,000 catalogs. In the past, rejected addresses were processed manually - they were printed on labels, applied by hand, and sent as First-Class mail. By correcting and properly formatting the addresses before printing them, Central Mail saved the organization 50 percent on the cost of mailing to the corrected addresses, even taking into account the hourly fee it charges to make corrections.

The Agriculture Health Study, in Epidemiology, used Central Mail for a 36,000-piece mailing this winter. The job required that Central Mail coordinate and process printed materials coming from another state with envelopes and a cover letter printed by Printing Service, says Ellen Heywood, the study's Iowa field coordinator. Address correction software and automated inserting, sealing, and addressing helped make the process seamless.

"It was very cost-efficient. All we had to do was write the cover letter and send it through our Human Subjects (IRB) Office. After that we didn't see anything, but all that work was going on. It was hands-off for us, and we received an updated mailing list to boot," says Heywood. "We haven't had contact with some of our participants in a long time; this was an easy way of confirming addresses. It is a long-term study, so it is very important to maintain contact with them."

The University of Iowa Foundation also has begun to work with Central Mail. "The UI Foundation uses Central Mail on a daily basis for a number of important reasons," says Julie Dahlberg, supervisor for the Foundation's mail center.

"First, their staff are extremely knowledgeable, service-oriented, and easy to work with. Second, their expertise, services, and equipment fit our needs, particularly for large-scale, nonprofit mailings. Third, Central Mail's services are priced very competitively, which helps us control costs for our UI clients."

Susan Shullaw, senior vice president for communications and campaign support at the Foundation, and Dahlberg worked with Kula to develop the processes they would use.

"We've been very pleased with Central Mail and their commitment to enhancing both the scope and quality of their services. In fact, we're currently exploring ways to expand our partnership with Central Mail and are looking forward to more joint ventures in the future," she says.

Central Mail customer service representative Helen Wilson spends a good deal of time correcting address files for bulk mailings. She offers the following advice on how to format them to speed up the processing and save money for your department:

• Create a spreadsheet that has these columns, in this order:
  1) name,   2) title,   3) company,   4) campus address (optional),   5) street address,   6) city,   7) state,   8) zip.
• A street address is mandatory. It may contain locational information, such as suite (STE) or building (BLDG), but must not contain department names, subtitles, or "in care of ....".
• Spell out cities. The address-checking software will not accept IC for Iowa City or NY NY, for New York City, for example.
• Use the correct nine-digit ZIP code, with a hyphen between the first five and last four digits.

All packages must be encased in corrugated cardboard boxes. Containers made of other materials (plastic, metal, styrofoam, or wood, for example) must be fully enclosed. This also applies to cylindrical items, such as barrels, drums, and pails, and oversized packages. The maximum size is 60 inches for the longest side, 30 inches for the second longest.

It is important to not reuse boxes that have hazardous materials markings - ORM or ORMD. UPS accepts hazardous materials only from authorized customers. Packages with these markings will not be allowed on flights and will be returned to the sender.

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Faculty and staff who are enrolled in the Employee Van Pool, TRIP, or Employee Bus Pass programs qualify for ERH, which provides a ride home via a cab when an emergency or illness arises. Participants can take a taxi home and be reimbursed for the cost of the ride. Pre-arranged appointments, meetings, weather emergencies, and work-related travel are not eligible for rides under the program. ERH can be used up to three times per year and may not exceed a cumulative total of $100 in reimbursements.

Commuter Programs hopes more UI employees will participate in its programs as a result of ERH. Typically, commuters cite fear of being stranded as one of the main obstacles to ride sharing. There has been increased interest in our ridesharing programs since ERH was put into place in December.

In addition to the Employee Van Pool, TRIP, and Employee Bus Pass programs, the Parking and Transportation Department supports the Carpool Matching Service and bicycling. Currently, more than 2,000 University employees are participating in our programs and enjoying their ride to work. For more information on our programs, go to www.uiowa.edu/~parking, phone 353-5770, or email commuter-programs@uiowa.edu.

Michelle Ribble

Lori grew up in Preston, Iowa, a small town north of Clinton. After graduating from high school in 1996 she moved to New York City, where she worked as a nanny while earning two associate degrees, in computer programming and business administration. "After being gone for six years, I knew I was ready to come back home to finish my education at Iowa." says Lori. She enrolled in the Tippie College of Business, intending to take time off from working. But she found she needed to work to stay more focused and organized during school.

"One day I was talking to a friend who said I should work at the parking ramps with her, so I applied and got a job," remembers Lori. She became a student cashier in the Parking and Transportation Department and within a year was promoted to student office assistant. Then, positions for a student coordinator and a full-time clerk III dispatcher opened up.

"Both jobs looked interesting to me so I applied for both," says Lori. She interviewed for the student position first, got the job, and began working at it last July. A short time later she interviewed for the dispatcher position, was offered that job, and started it in August. "I was thrilled to get back to work full time while finishing up my BA in Business Management. I like to keep busy. It keeps me focused."

She finds being in a supervisory position rewarding. "I feel I have a worthwhile job, overseeing the late-night parking operations and handling any complication that arises at the office after hours." She also finds it gratifying when student cashiers come to her with their challenges and problems of school, personal relationships, and sometimes things that arise on the job.

"Being in a position where people rely on you makes you feel like you are doing something for yourself and the people around you. I really enjoy the people and the atmosphere here. Learning the system from the bottom up sure makes you appreciate what the cashiers experience on a daily basis, and being able to help them through rough times with patrons makes my job even more rewarding," says Lori.

"It is nice to have a job that you enjoy going to every day. It makes life a lot easier when juggling work, family, and school."

Michelle Ribble

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Variable data printing (VDP) is a matter of printing multiple similar documents, each with unique characteristics, in a single print run. The process merges a static document design with information from database records. VDP users claim much higher response rates to their mailings, which means not only more effective, but also more cost-effective communication.

The idea is similar to mail merge but allows for more variability within the individual documents - in graphics, layout, number of pages, bar code, and colors, for example. Projects can range from lower volume, simple desktop publishing work to high-volume, complex jobs that need extensive setup and precise production specifications. Software developers and equipment manufacturers are working on the technology and infrastructure to make VDP flow as well as many desktop applications.

Common uses of variable printing you may recognize are credit-card applications and fundraising letters that arrive by mail at your home. Other uses include product labels, tickets, coupons, insurance policies and benefit booklets, bank statements, bills, and investment performance reports. VDP is also known as customized printing or publishing, database publishing, on-demand printing, 1:1 communication or publishing, personalized printing or publishing, and variable information printing. Documents in PDF and HTML formats also can be produced with variable data techniques, so the term variable-data publishing is used to include on-line as well as printed documents.

In both cases, the order usually will need more work to print the way the customer expects it to. This adds time and charges, and, usually, the work duplicates what the customer has already done: keying text, recentering columns, saving the file in a different format, or replacing low-resolution graphics with high-resolution ones, for example.

"Sometimes it would be cheaper, and definitely faster, for us to format it from the beginning," says prepress supervisor Chris Swart. He recommends sending a laser as a mockup and the keystrokes, saved as a Word file, for us to use to create the piece. Save them in rich text format (RTF) if you want font styles preserved. "We have the applications on hand, the people who work with it day in, day out. We can do it quicker than someone who is inexperienced or working with a program not suited for printing."

"If they're new to layout or are using Microsoft Word or Publisher, I'd like them to think in terms of being a gatherer of information, and suppling it to us," he says. "If you like the challenge of doing the layout, that's fine. But please call us ahead and maybe we can head off some potential problems."

When the University needs its capital project plans, the Wide Media Center delivers. Many factors make it happen, but the one that stands out is commitment.

The last of seven plan sets for the Kinnick Stadium remodeling project arrived Thursday, January 20, and the Center's three staff members dug in their heels, planned an around-the-clock schedule to meet the January 24 deadline, and got to work. The equipment ran nonstop, with at least one staff member on hand at all times. No one left until another arrived as a replacement.

Four days later, 126 packages of plans, for the press box and east and west concourses, were on their way to the 42 addresses on the bid list.

Plans come in to the Center as separate electronic files, often from different sources. Staff organize the files into a single electronic document, print it on 30x42-inch sheets, and bind these into plan books. A specification book is printed and bound separately. The plan book and the spec book are packaged together as a set and mailed to contractors.

In this case the complete sets wouldn't fit into the mailing bags, so each set was broken into three volumes and mailed separately. The mailing to each address consisted of three cylindrical plastic bags, each containing a two-inch thick spec book and a plan book with either 73, 267, or 319 sheets.

Bids on the project were due February 23, so staff at the Center continued to print and distribute the plans on request until then.

"We still had to provide them to anyone who asked. A lot of people were asking. It seems like everyone wants a piece of Kinnick Stadium," says supervisor Janet Wieland.

This completes the first of several rounds of printing for the plans. There are seven bid packages, all of which have been printed and distributed. When addenda start to come in, staff at the Center will incorporate them into the originals and reprint the sets.

"It's a lot of work," says Wieland. "A lot of detail."

The Printing Department supports software programs that are considered standard for the printing industry and used by the majority of its customers. Generally, this includes the current version of a program and its immediate predecessor. Contact Mike Cash for details about using the Adobe Creative Suite collection and for other questions about software. Contact Chris Swart for information about setting up and sending us files. This will help you avoid output problems that could cost time and money.

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The new contract offers a custom catalog and reduced pricing on most items, and a new web ordering system for our p-card users. We anticipate few changes beyond significantly lower prices on office products. Prices will be reduced on over 80 percent of the items that our customers purchased during the past year. We expect to save The University of Iowa more than $200,000 each year with this new contract.

We welcome OfficeMax and its staff to The University of Iowa as we begin a new partnership with a new office supply contract.

Gary Anderson

To order catalogs, email genstores@uiowa.edu with your name, department name, campus delivery address, and the number of catalogs you need. Use your p-card to order at www.officemaxsolutions.com. You will need a user name and password for access to the system; email gary-anderson@uiowa.edu to request them.

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Story ideas: Are there topics we haven't covered that you would like to see in our newsletter? Do you have questions you would like us to address? Send an e-mail to jenean-arnold@uiowa.edu or a memo to Into Print,126C MBSB.

Address corrections and additions: If you wish to be added to the Into Print mailing list, fill out and send our form or e-mail the following information [University of Iowa campus addresses and @uiowa.edu e-mail suffixes only] to jenean-arnold@uiowa.edu:

• Your name
• Department
• Campus Mail address
• whether you want the print version, e-mail notification of Web posting, or both.

E-mail us: Send questions and comments about departmental topics to:

Bionic Bus . . . bionic-bus@uiowa.edu
Cambus information . . . cambus-dispatching@uiowa.edu
Central Mail . . . central-mail@uiowa.edu
Commuter programs . . . commuter-programs@uiowa.edu
General Stores . . . genstores@uiowa.edu
Motor Pool . . . motor-pool@uiowa.edu
Parking facilities operations . . . facilities-dispatch@uiowa.edu
Parking services . . . parking-office@uiowa.edu
Wide Media Center . . . widemedia-printing@uiowa.edu

Copy Centers:
Boyd Law . . . dcblb-printing@uiowa.edu
Hardin Library . . . dchlhs-printing@uiowa.edu
Iowa Memorial Union . . . dcimu-printing@uiowa.edu
Med Labs . . . dcml-printing@uiowa.edu
Mossman Building . . . dcmbsb-printing@uiowa.edu
Pappajohn Bldg . . . dcpbb-printing@uiowa.edu
UPACS and Copyright Service . . . upacs-printing@uiowa.edu