Generation Press Interview

For my Context book I wanted to talk to a printers that were forward thinking and progressive - adapting to the changing situation of print in the context of graphic design. Who better then to contact than my friends at Generation Press. Scrub was good enough to spend some of his valuable time answering my questions on the subject: 

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The Future State of Print

Do you think the print industry will print ever totally die out in this increasingly digital age?

No! I hope not anyway, the craft will stay but to what level remains to be seen.

What do you feel is the value of print delivery over digital delivery? 

Creativity, flexibility and quantity.

A sad thought but…. are JPEGs the new album covers?

Absolutely not. There is still a strong desire within consumers for the physical objects that house music. A JPEG will never come close to the level of interaction felt by the user of  physical format. The physical production of packaging may have been scaled down by record labels but this means that emphasis has shifted to quality over disposability.

Is there still room for printed matter in the increasingly sustainable marketplace? 

Yes (see below).

What steps have you put in place to enable Generation Press to remain ecologically viable? Is it a subject close to your heart?

Every step of our way is informed by our sustainability, it helps understand our processes even better and reduce waste to a bare minimum. Yes this is very close to our hearts.

With your focus on specialist promotion & print, is it your firm belief that information needs some sort of physicality to maintain its intrinsic value?

The less it is being used the more valuable it will become...

Any final words on the future of print?

Print is Not Dead! Print has just begun a new chapter
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His answers sum up my feelings toward print - its going through a bit of an identity crisis at the moment but I don't think it will every die. The less it is used the rarer and more valuable it will become. I think that the digitisation of  much printed matter means that there is now a strong emphasis on the quality of print over mass production. In the coming years I see it becoming less disposable and more collectable with only applicable / necessary  jobs going to print. With our increasingly screen based culture there is always going to be a certain unrivaled value with printed items - people like products and physical things that they can hold and this shift toward quality will only serve to build on this desire. The change is going to sort the wheat from the chaff in many respects - digital distribution id the new mass production and high quality print will remain the ever desirable high quality print it always has been.