Page 4 - BOSS Today Issue 11

I may have

been rIght

after all

Having a focus on paper as we do in this issue

brings back some memories for me. When I first
joined the office supplies industry in 1989 I made
a bold prediction, as all young go-getters are

accustomed to do, that we would all be working
in paperless offices by the year 2000

ell, clearly that hasn’t happened Our industry needs to continue to
W– hasn’t anything like happened, innovate, to see how we can still serve
and I have been made to eat humble our customer in a world that relies far
pie. But there has been more of a seismic less on paper. After all, paper may be
change than you might at first realise. declining in importance, but offices
Electronic office supplies now make up certainly aren’t. They still need supplying.
50 per cent of all office product sales by That’s part of the reason why we
volume, while paper sales have dwindled are keen to help you, our membership,
to 9 per cent of value in comparison. through these difficult economic
And, without wanting to make too times. With this issue of BOSS you will
many bold predictions again, I suspect find our supplement to accessing
another change is on the horizon. I finance. But we don’t just stop there.
went to a seminar run by print research We are taking the whole issue of
consultancy PIRA earlier this year, where how to get more funds into your
they said that in the month of December business out to you, the membership.
2011 alone, four million Kindles were sold. Throughout April, May and June this
Such a number may have been bumped year we will be running special access
up by Christmas, of course, but it is to finance workshops. It’s part of our
significant. It shows that the consumer is philosophy that BOSS is out there to
finally catching on to the idea of reading help you.
electronically. And that could just as easily mean
This is bound to have an effect not to help you into an easy retirement
necessarily on book reading, but certainly as it could be to help you expand
on other types of media that still rely on your business or look for aquisitions.
paper. PIRA made the prediction that While there are plenty of office supply
between 2006 and 2016 newspaper and companies growing steadily out there,
magazine production – at least for those we also know that, particularly at
publications that still come out in print – a time like this, there are plenty
will fall by 70 per cent. It also reckons that of company managers who want to
catalogue production will fall by 40 per retire but want to pass their business
cent. That last figure is important because over into safe hands. Our roadshows
printed catalogues have been a huge will be aimed at both types of
part of our industry in the past. business. I hope to see you there. n
So even if I am no longer making such
bold predictions, I think we need to grasp Michael Gardner
that change is upon us. BOSS CEO

4 BOSS TODAY | March 2012

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