Executive Q&A: Laura Lawton, President, Lawton Printing, Inc. and File-Ez Folder, Inc.

PN: Tell us a little about your company, the segment of the market it serves, and what you consider to be your "core" users/customers.

Lawton Printing is a 77-year-old family company. It was founded by my great-grandfather and grandfather in a chicken coop behind my great-grandfather’s house. I am the fourth generation to lead the company and am majority owner. My brother Aaron Lawton and cousin Dana Lawton are the other two owners in the business.

Through the years, Lawton has always embraced new technologies to provide new solutions to its clients. In the fall of 2016, we made the decision to once again embrace technology and move from a mix of offset and digital solutions to 100% digital with the investment in an HP 10000.

Our core clients range from small businesses, large utility companies, design firms, colleges and universities, to real estate companies. What we are able to offer each of them is complete solution to support their brand – from logo design, to a website, to marketing collateral including promotional items or “swag”, to mailing and fulfillment. In essence, we can function as a company's marketing department so they can focus on their core business.

PN: How did you get involved with the company? What is your background before that?

As I said, it is a family business. After pursing a couple of others majors in college, I transferred to California Polytechnic State University and majored in graphic communications with a concentration in printing management. After graduation, I came back to Spokane and started working for my family.

PN: What do you consider your greatest achievement in this market to be?

I think my greatest achievement is surviving through the recession. We had to significantly downsize our business and staff, like many others. We are a much different company today than we were in 2008, with about a third of the staff we once had. It is much easier to understand and embrace change when you are a small company which has helped us with our transition to a completely digital company.

PN: If there was anything you could change, either about your career in regards to the print industry, your company, or the market as a whole, what would it be and why?

Print gets overlooked by the general public. No one thinks about how their calendar or Costco coupons happen. They don’t think about how their cereal box is created. It is taken for granted. And sometimes when we are thought of, it is for killing trees. I wish the industry was better able to collectively advocate for itself. Different associations have done it better than others but there isn’t one clear “pro print” voice. That makes it easy for our clients to just not print as it is a large line item in their budget and they can take their marketing “online” as it is cheaper and “environmentally friendly”.

PN: What do you consider the greatest challenge to be for the industry right now? Why?

I think the greatest challenge is staying a relevant piece of our clients' marketing plans. We need to be more than a printer. There are so many ways for our clients to market themselves, we need to continue to make the case for print as one of those solutions in combination with digital technologies. We began offering website services to clients in 1995. This allowed us to have different conversations with our clients and at times stay in the mix as they were developing their marketing plans. We now offer not only websites but email marketing, apps, storefronts, and custom programming solutions along with traditional and personalized print solutions. Data is also a challenge for many of our clients. It will continue to be crucial to how our clients market, so we need to be able to understand and interpret their data to help them.

PN: What do you consider the greatest asset to be for the industry right now? Why?

The greatest asset I see is the continual evolution of technology. I love what we can now accomplish with our larger digital press – the personalized market continues to grow in acceptance and our clients are seeing how using a targeted approach can increase their return on investment – either in more sales, more fundraising dollars given, more attendance – whatever they are trying to achieve.

PN: In your opinion, what have been the biggest changes to the way we communicate with one another in the past few years? How would you recommend this industry take advantage of that?

I think email and texting have been the two biggest changes in communication recently. As I said earlier, many businesses take the less expensive way to market and send an email. We all get hundreds of emails a day, many of which I delete before I ever read them. So I don’t think that is an effective way to market if you want to stand out. Print is tactile, it stands out. And when you add personalization, it stands out even more. We need to continue to showcase how print is an effective piece in a marketing solution, that it drives people to action. Those of us in this industry need to share our solutions with our peers so we can all thrive.

PN: Looking ahead, what major innovations or technologies do you believe will shape the future of the industry? Why?

As I said before, technology drives this industry. Turnaround times continue to shrink and projects are more complex. Speed will continue to be the major change and inkjet technology is the next wave.

PN: What is the biggest piece of advice you would give to printers and others involved in this industry?

Lawton Printing's success through the years has come from our outside affiliations. We have always been involved with industry associations where we have had the opportunity to meet great people across the country and learn how their companies work. Once a year, I speak to a business class at one of our local universities and each time I tell them once they are employed to get involved in something – the local Chamber of Commerce, their industry association, rotary, something where you can meet others and learn from them. It has been the single best thing we have done for our business.

PN: Is there anything else you would like to share with our readers?

I love this industry, I’m passionate about what we do and the impact we have. Ever-changing technology keeps our business evolving and I can’t wait to see where we are 10 years from now.