Designer of the Year
Innovation Makes Drew & Rogers No. 1.
An in-house, creative graphics department is key for leading in design.
The time was 1944. The place was Newark, N.J. The setting was an old war-time register forms company where two innovative employees named Aubrey Drew and Fred Rogers were inspired to start their own forms brokerage business. With $250 be-tween them, the duo took a chance and, in the tradition of Abbott & Costello and other great teams of their time, named the new-found company Drew & Rogers.
"This was before there was such a thing as a broker business," said Carl Marino, vice president. "From the very beginning Drew & Rogers was an innovative enterprise."
This may be exactly why the company is a leader in print design today. The staff's successful foresight, coupled with their passion and commitment to design—a paramount element in the current marketplace—are two additional reasons.
"Solving problems customers present to us and piecing them together in time frames that seem impossible is one of the passions I have for this line of work," said President Tom Rogers. "Many of us share that feeling, and we tend to compete with each other for better solutions."
Rogers, the youngest son of Fred Rogers, worked for a couple of manufacturers before coming on board at Drew & Rogers in 1985. In 1992 he was named president and CEO, and by 1996 bought out the graphics art business of the company's current art director, Michael Monteleone.
The purchase was a direct result of the company's vision of where the forms industry was headed.
"Our company saw the future of the forms business about 10 years ago and we knew we needed to pursue alternative products," said Marino. "That's when we started getting into commercial printing, ad specialties and creative packaging design in a big way." Today about 70 percent of Drew & Rogers' business is related to commercial printing, while only 30 percent is associated with traditional forms.
Because of this market shift, the more than $200,000 investment in a design department was an unquestionable solution. "This was a crucial investment for us," said Rogers. "It allows us to turn around orders a lot more quickly on the design side."
Proving to be a worthwhile investment, the graphics department has experienced significant growth since its inception.
"It's definitely unique for a broker to have an in-house graphics department," said Monteleone. He noted that during the past four years the department has grown to five employees and encompasses everything from design to typesetting. And although it's not a full-blown ad agency, Monteleone said he does have aspirations for it to become one.
Currently, he added, the graphic arts department has a significant impact on the company, mainly from the sales staff standpoint. "Having us here makes it a lot easier for them," he said. "Because if a customer comes up with an idea and looks to our company for a solution, we can tell them what works and what doesn't. We know how to get the best yield."
The ability to be cost-effective does not hinder the team's creativity, however. Said Rogers, "I think we have a very good design staff that tends to be cutting-edge and contemporary, not stale."
Reengineering the design of a cli-ent's product is one example of such ingenuity.
"We had one company that sent out 10,000 instructional kits a year with five to 10 books as collateral," said Rogers. "We created a tote and reengineered the kit to ship it flat. The project was an overall money-saver and it brought in a very successful response rate."
Drew & Rogers takes pride in discovering ways to redesign a project to better suit a customer's needs. "We alter designs a lot," said Rogers. "Many times a designer will send us something that looks pretty, but just doesn't work. Our challenge is to redesign it while maintaining as much of the attractiveness as we can."
Another example of the company's successful problem-solving ability is evident in the double record album-inspired menu that was created for Universal Studios' City Walk Motown Cafe. This particular piece was named Best of Show and took the Platinum Award for commercial/promotional printing in last year's BFL&S Top Design Contest. The original product was constructed from three separate pieces manually glued on the inside to form pockets. Because the menus frequently came apart, Marino and Monteleone converted the design to a single piece with a laminate. By treating the menu's text—which includes pricing, food selections and credit card guidelines—as a fifth color, changes to the menu could be done with ease.
Marino explained that the uniqueness of a Drew & Rogers project is generally determined by a customer's needs. "We don't think inside the box. We try to think in terms of how we can best solve a client's problem," he said.
"For instance, with direct mail you basically have 15 to 30 seconds to get someone's attention. The recipient is going to pick it up, look at it and either decide to open it or throw it away. We create a design that triggers curiosity."
Marino conceded that Drew & Rogers gleans a lot of ideas from the manufacturing plants it deals with—namely the Buffalo, New York-based Colad Group—and added that many vendors seek out Drew & Rogers because of its reputation for being highly professional. "We get ideas from companies we deal with, as well. In fact, Tom probably gets five calls a week from companies wanting to make a presentation to us."
Producing quality designs is also the result of loyalty, said Marino. "We are not the kind of broker that will shop all over. We have a group of approved vendors that we trust."
In fact, Drew & Rogers looks to six different business forms manufacturers and six different commercial printing manufacturers on a regular basis to handle its oftentimes unique requests.
"Commercial printing is an especially interesting animal," said Marino. "Our jobs can range from 500 four-color process sell sheets to millions of full-color brochures or booklets, and we have short-, medium- and long-run plants to handle the variations."
Taking everything into consideration, Rogers feels that the entire staff is responsible for the quality work produced as well as the company's latest structural changes.
"I think a commitment to service is probably No. 1," said Rogers. "And the fact that we have everything under one roof now, from direct mail printing to compilation, also helps." Rogers added that in the two years the entire company has been housed within the same 50,000 sq. ft. of space, Drew & Rogers, as a vendor, has become more saleable.
Marino agreed, stating that the company does everything from simple copy jobs to the most involved four- and five-color jobs. "The catalyst of our company's success is service and professionalism," said Marino. "Our customers are generally very sophisticated and knowledgeable and if we don't give them that service, they will find it somewhere else."
Rogers concluded that taking the initiative to evolve with the times is one of the major factors that keeps Drew & Rogers abreast of the latest business demands.
"Marketing design has become so much more important," said Rogers. "It seems to be the wave of future that customers are looking for creative packaging and ad specialties."
By Sharon R. Cole