End of the road for the middleman

When printers complain that trading has become all about price, some point their finger at Price. The poster boy for the Australian print management movement is well aware of criticisms about print managers, but they leave him perplexed. “I hear all this moaning but no one has ever come up to me and had a face-to-face discussion, which I’m always happy to have.

“I haven’t actually heard a logical argument that explains to me what the problem is with print management and how that has affected a printer’s business. The mid-tier printers that are complaining – if we weren’t here and they weren’t getting work from us, they wouldn’t see the work because it would go to the large groups. My business model was always about feeding work to the mid-tier and small players. That was the whole business model.”

Those printers currently choking on their coffee at hearing this alpha print manager pitching himself as a champion of the little guy might’ve been too busy spluttering to notice Price’s use of the word ‘was’. After more than 30 years in the industry and 13 at the helm of the country’s leading print management company, the founder of Stream Solutions is not just leaving the business and the industry, he’s flying the country. Price is taking a long hiatus in Europe (no doubt with an earn-out from the 2007 buyout of Stream by Toll Group burning a hole in his back pocket).