If you ever get the opportunity to attend one of Marco Boer’s presentations, you will most likely come away with at least two impressions: a sobering view of how complex the production print business has become and a surprising amount of optimism about where it is headed. As president of IT Strategies, Boer and his team conduct hundreds of interviews each year with commercial printers, label converters and other producers, then combine those field observations with market data. His keynote at a recent Konica Minolta Client Engagement Center VIP Demo Event offered a useful roadmap for dealers selling production print into commercial environments.
Rising costs, labor challenges and regulatory pressure are real, but those that invest in automation, workflow and higher-value applications have significant room to grow.
A more complicated business
Boer opened with the pressures reshaping the market: tariffs, geopolitical uncertainty, fuel prices, inflation and continued increases in paper, ink and other imported supplies. The result, especially heading into election and holiday periods, is a surge in smaller, less predictable orders that complicate scheduling, setup and profitability for commercial printers.
He described visiting plants with well-maintained, fully amortized offset presses that can no longer keep pace with today’s workload because short, frequent jobs create too much setup and too much inefficiency. His conclusion was clear: The path forward is focused around how effectively a print provider automates workflow, finishing and job management while moving toward applications that deliver more value per job.
That is an important point for dealers. Commercial print customers increasingly need partners who can help improve efficiency across the full production environment, not just sell the next press.
Pressure points reshaping print
Boer highlighted three structural issues that will shape the business over the next several years: labor, paper and regulation.
On labor, he pointed to long-term demographic trends. Since the 2008 recession, birth rates have declined in the U.S., Europe and Japan, contributing to a smaller pipeline of workers entering the economy. At the same time, print-related occupations are among the fastest-declining categories through 2033, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data cited in Boer’s presentation. His view is that this makes automation even more necessary, while also increasing the need for more technically capable employees.
Paper is the more immediate concern. Boer said the number of U.S. mills producing coated paper has dropped dramatically over the past two decades, tightening supply and contributing to repeated price increases. His slide deck noted that only three coated paper mills remain in the U.S., that one is expected to exit the market by 2030, and that prices could increase 5% to 10% by year-end because of geopolitical issues. For dealers serving commercial printers, those conditions reinforce the value of shorter-run, better-targeted, higher-margin work that can be produced efficiently on digital platforms.
Regulation is another emerging factor. Boer called attention to extended producer responsibility laws in 11 states, which shift recycling-related costs from municipalities to producers and require detailed reporting based on material type and recyclability. While those laws were primarily designed for packaging, he noted they are already affecting applications such as direct mail and adding another layer of complexity for print providers shipping into multiple states.
Digital creates new value
Boer’s optimism comes from where the market is growing. IT Strategies tracks global page volumes by technology, and Boer said offset pages continue to decline while digital print pages are growing by roughly 11% annually. His presentation also projected a 26% compound annual growth rate for worldwide production cut-sheet inkjet page volume from 2026 through 2031.
The larger point is that digital is not simply replacing offset. Boer argued that digital is enabling a different class of output: shorter-run, versioned, more targeted and more valuable work. In that sense, offset remains important, but digital becomes the vehicle for applications that command higher margins and stronger relevance.
His data on cut-sheet inkjet points to one especially important area. In North America, Boer’s presentation projected especially strong growth in B2 cut-sheet inkjet pages from 2025 to 2031, outpacing toner in that format. For dealers coming from an office and light-production background, that matters because it signals where commercial printers may invest next as they look for better productivity on shorter runs.
Where growth is showing up
Boer identified several application areas with meaningful opportunity, including direct mail, general commercial print, embellishment and labels.
Direct mail remains one of the clearest examples. Boer described it as increasingly a U.S.-centric application, aided by measurable return on investment and improving targeting. He argued that AI is helping brands refine predictability of response, making direct mail campaigns more relevant and more defensible even as costs rise.
General commercial print also remains a large and varied market, covering everything from business cards to point-of-purchase graphics and “shelf talkers,” the small signs or tags mounted on the edge of a retail shelf to call out specific products or promotions. Boer shared an example of a major retailer using digital print to produce shelf talkers in store-specific sequence, reducing labor and saving substantial money in the process. That kind of work underscores the value of digital print when paired with data, workflow and operational precision.
Embellishment is where Boer’s “luxury” framing becomes most visible. His presentation showed growth in digital embellishment pages, especially in foiling and spot varnish. Boer argued that embellishment helps print providers differentiate their work, create a stronger sensory impact and command premium pricing. For dealers, that is an important mindset shift: success can be found in helping customers produce pages worth more money rather than just in printing more pages.
Labels may be the biggest long-term opportunity of all. Boer pointed to the GS1 Sunrise 2027 initiative, which is intended to support the shift toward more data-rich codes for product identification, traceability, anti-counterfeiting and consumer engagement. He said that as brands and retailers move toward those requirements, digital label printing is positioned for substantial growth because labels are often the most practical place to handle variable and serialized information.
A new role for dealers
One of Boer’s most useful observations for the channel is that production print (similar to the legacy copier business) no longer works like it used to. This is not simply a matter of replacing a piece of equipment at the end of a lease with a slightly faster model. Production environments require a broader platform approach that includes engines, workflow, finishing and consultative support.
He stressed that workflow and finishing now matter as much as the press itself. In fact, Boer said the strongest interest at industry events increasingly centers on finishing and on the software needed to control growing job complexity. His warning was equally practical: Buying workflow software is not enough if it is never fully implemented or used.
That message should resonate with dealers looking beyond office MFPs. The opportunity in production print is not just in hardware placements. It is in helping customers understand per-job profitability, reduce margin erosion, automate touchpoints and expand into applications where digital printing has clear economic and strategic advantages.
Boer argued that the market is already separating into two camps: companies that continue to invest and adapt, and companies that are effectively managing decline. Sound familiar? The dealers that want to grow in this segment will need to align with the first group and develop the expertise to guide those investments.
Why Boer remains optimistic
Despite the pressures, Boer’s overall outlook was positive. He described the current period as a unique time for digital printing because suppliers and print providers now have access to a wider range of engines, more capable workflow software, more responsive finishing and new tools, including AI, that can improve efficiency and application targeting. His larger argument is that print is not disappearing. It is evolving from a commodity business toward a more selective, higher-value and more automated one. Dealers that understand that shift and help customers act on it can play a meaningful role in the next phase of production print growth.
Patricia Ames is president and senior analyst for BPO Media, which publishes The Imaging Channel and Workflow magazines. As a market analyst and industry consultant, Ames has worked for prominent consulting firms including KPMG and has more than 15 years experience in the imaging industry covering technology and business sectors. Ames has lived and worked in the United States, Southeast Asia and Europe and enjoys being a part of a global industry and community.