Sometimes it is refreshing to stop and look back at where you have come from to realize where you are going. I spent the last two days at Prospect Vision, a data mining and direct mail printing company that I bought at the beginning of 2018. Having never had a dream or even thought about being in the mail/printing business, it was one of those opportunities that just got served up on a plate in front of me and was too good not to take a shot at.
It was a different kind of place when I walked in before ever buying it. The facility was run down, printing machines looked old and tired and the carpet was dirty. I can always tell the attention to detail that has gone into a place by simply looking at the carpet. But the power in this organization wasn’t the old equipment or the tired carpet, it was the people. The people were so eager to do great work and so thrilled at the possibility to up their game that it just felt like the right thing to do. So, I embarked on my first intro into printing/production as an owner and went for it not knowing anything about how this industry worked.
Like anything, I soon found that the more volume you did the better off things looked. It was apparent that volume could solve a lot of problems and give us the ability to grow faster and get things like new equipment that was bigger and faster and even allow us to make enough of a profit to replace the carpet.
Now, after seeing the low of beginning and printing 50,000 pieces of mail a month to the high of printing over 500,000 pieces of mail a month, and being able to survive a downturn like Covid-19, I walked out of the building today on my way back home with a real feeling of accomplishment.
In 34 months, we have printed 10,766,372 pieces of direct mail out of a small unit in an industrial office park. Some people (and very high up ones at that) told me when I started that this business was a joke and “good luck with this one,” as a sign that they wanted nothing to do with it. Other people wished me luck and cheered me and the team on the entire way, trying to give every ounce of support possible. But the main thing I have learned thus far is you never know just how much you can do until you try. Now all I want to do is try a little harder.