Arguably, no industry has been changed more by technology than printing. Although a young man by most standards, Initial Print owner Sheng Gan has been in the printing business since the ‘90s and has watched as traditional offset printing gave way to digital printing of ever-increasing quality, and services that were previously stratospheric in price became affordable for all. It’s a change his shop has embraced since its opening in 2006.
Although business cards, brochures, and reports make up the bulk of the shop’s work, Sheng’s interest in keeping abreast of his industry has allowed him to increase the pace, and produce more unusual items for his customers—like banners, free-standing signs, packaging, and stickers—economically, and astonishingly quickly. “We’re hands-on, but we stay on top of technology, for sure. The quality keeps getting better and better. Work that used to take a long time is now very fast. Bigger firms sometimes use a queue system to manage their clients, so it’s first come, first served, regardless of job size. We’re more flexible.”