Miller`s
They take data from the web in a fully automated operation.
We don’t pre-ight anything, which further accelerates throughput.”
The revolution in photography
The company also processes 50,000 rolls of lm each year.
That’s down from a peak of 2.4 million, and illustrates the
change the industry has undergone.
“In fact, digital is about 25 percent of our work,” Coleman says.
“75 percent of our business is silver halide. All individual prints
are produced on our 100+ silver halide printers.
“Fifteen years ago, we just produced photographs,” says
Coleman. “Today, we have thousands of product options and
add hundreds of new ones each year. The HP Indigo digital
presses have helped with that, and also given us the potential
to develop further oerings using features like the seven-color
option, textured prints, digital matte, and other added
value eects.”
With the range of Miller’s product line and its 24-hour
turnaround times, reliability is essential.
“Our operators are HP trained and capable of resolving most
issues quickly,” Coleman explains. “HP is very responsive and
knowledgeable. We normally run two extended shifts for a
12 – 13 hour work day. During peak season, we run 24/7 and
have a trained service engineer on the oor all night to keep the
presses running.”
Dierentiation through nishing
Given the large number of photo specialty products, Miller’s
has a comprehensive range of nishing equipment.
“Our production lines are arranged by product for maximum
eciency, so the right nishing equipment is near each press,”
Martin explains. “We have die-cutters for luxury cards; perfect
binders, trimmers, saddle stitchers and spiral binders for
calendars; side-sewing for hard-cover books; glue padding for
notepads, and so on. We also have some specialty equipment
like foil stamping for cards, UV coaters, laminators and
magnetic strips.
“We are very pleased with the presses, the workow and the
service. We’ll be adding more space and more digital presses
in the future. We’ve grown every year since we focused on
processing in 1970. We can only continue that by staying
ahead,” Coleman concludes.
“ We had customers
screaming for
photo products on
substrates that our
dry toner digital
printers couldn’t
deliver. Our HP
Indigo 7000-series
Digital Presses are
able to; they have
helped us develop
our product range
and do things we
couldn’t before.”
– Todd Coleman, president and
COO, Miller’s Professional Imaging
© Copyright 2014 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to
change without notice. The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express warranty
statements accompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an
additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.
4AA5-4750ENW, September 2014
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Installing 10 HP Indigo 7000-series Digital Presses in a
three year period is a big investment by any standard, and
demonstrates not only faith in the technology but also in
continued market growth.
In spite of enormous changes in the industry, communications
and social customs, photographs have remained the preferred
way to keep and share experiences and memories.
Beginning in 1939 when Bill Miller began his wedding and
portrait photography business in Pittsburg, Kansas, ‘staying
ahead’ has been a driving principle. 75 years later, Miller’s
Professional Imaging, incorporating the online consumer
service Mpix.com, has 400 employees, hundreds of photo
specialty products and customers throughout North America.
“Miller’s serves professional photographers and is based in
Columbia, Missouri. Mpix, for consumers, is in Pittsburg, Kansas,”
explains Todd Coleman, president and COO, Miller’s Professional
Imaging, and grandson of the founder. “It was all built from a
potential disaster and a sound understanding of the future.”
The pursuit of excellence
After World War II, in which he was a distinguished
cinematographer whose footage is still seen in documentaries,
Miller continued his photography business and began
processing lm for professional photographers. In 1970,
his studio burned down and he was faced with the decision
whether to rebuild, or focus on his processing enterprise,
which had not been aected by the re. Miller chose the latter
and today Miller’s Professional Imaging is a $120+ million,
debt-free company, handling millions of orders annually.
“We are in constant pursuit of excellence,” Coleman says. “This
applies to the quality of our photographic work as well as to the
products we oer professional photographers and customers.
We’re pretty much control freaks and do everything ourselves,
in-house.”
The list of products available from Miller’s covers all the
expected items and formats as well as the more novel,
like wooden USB drives, die-cut and pop-out greeting cards,
custom printed DVDs, and metal and acrylic wall art.
“Mpix has a scaled-down oering for consumers, but all
orders are turned around within 24 hours,” Coleman says.
“Orders received by 3:00pm are out the door by 6:00pm.
That happens in August when we handle 36,000 orders
per week, or in December when there are 130,000.”
Miller’s 10 HP Indigo digital presses are essentially dedicated
to greeting card and calendar production, as well as certain
specialty items, handling about 50 percent of the orders.
“We have the most vocal customers in the world, and when we
began receiving a big demand for products requiring heavier
stocks, we knew we’d have to respond,” explains Coleman.
“Our existing eet of 10 toner-based printers couldn’t handle
the heavier stocks and we also knew that our competition had
HP Indigo presses, so, wanting to stay ahead, we talked to HP.”
The company now has three of its HP Indigo digital presses
in Columbia, for professional work, and seven in Pittsburg,
meeting the demand from Mpix customers.
“We have HP SmartStream servers running with custom-built
HP servers,” says John Martin, production manager at Miller’s,
in Columbia. “The HP SmartStream server handles the
imposition and the HP custom-server drives the JDF workow.