We recently ran across articles titled Largest. QR Code. Ever. But Why? and Rooftop QR Codes Aim to Infiltrate Google Maps. It seems that creating huge QR codes which can only be fully seen from the air is the latest craze in QR code marketing. In the first story, a new social networking platform called Skanz painted a huge QR code as a publicity stunt. But the second article discusses a new service called Blue Marble which aims to use Google Earth and Google Maps as a marketing platform by installing huge QR codes on building rooftops.

While these sound like interesting gimmicks, we have to wonder about the effectiveness of rooftop QR code advertising. What do you think? Are these companies taking QR codes just a little too far?

Just think of the “Chance” and “Community Chest” cards one can come up with in planning a game your clients and prospects can play at lunch or with family? Because only an idiot would spend their hard-earned pass-Go money on those lousy utilities, why not come up with something that actually pays? Hey…that’s Life?

Come up with some rules that present players with some Risk! Create a virtual Candyland of delight and joy with your logo all over the place. A great promotion is no Trivial Pursuit when it comes to something people will talk about for years. When it comes to word of mouth advertising, you’ll have a Monopoly in your industry.

So, give us a call and let R and R Images take a Mystery Date and turn it into a deadline and we’ll create a package that will have hours of fun…ours and yours!

The photo product printing side of our business experiences a large increase in volume during the fourth quarter of the year as customers order photo products as gifts. In order to cope with that increase and still maintain the other printing work we do, we need to hire 130 people for day, swing and night shift work. The jobs we’re looking to fill are:

• Digital press operators
• Cutter operators
• Bindery specialists
• Fulfillment/shipping specialists
• General laborers

Many businesses which make use of direct mail in their marketing campaigns read these news stories and wonder “Should I keep relying on mail for a significant portion of my marketing?” Email marketing, SMS marketing, social media, search engine marketing and many other channels seem like more attractive places to invest marketing dollars.

The truth is all of those channels are useful for getting a marketing message in front of prospective customers. But so is direct mail. It is one of the few channels which allows a business to put a physicical object in the hands of a prospect and grab their attention, even if it’s only for a few seconds. Studies repeatedly show the effectiveness of well-executed direct mail campaigns.

The USPS may be going through tough times, but it’s not going vanish like some troubled companies. The postal service is an entity which is both too big and too important to fail. Mail may not be as widely used in the digital age as it was before, but it is still an important part of the national infrastructure. A solution for the difficulties will be found. It may be tough to fix the problems, but they will be fixed.

So direct mailers shouldn’t give up on the USPS. Keep using mail as a marketing channel. Not only does it help to support the postal service during one of its most difficult hours, but it’s also just plain good for business.

One of the NYILFF ads shows a target practice chart with only one bullet nicking the shoulder of a human figure while a barrage of bullets surrounds the chart. The caption on the chart reads, “Villain’s accuracy against the hero in a movie,” perfectly expressing movie watchers’ frustration with film protagonists seemingly always facing incompetent marksmen. If you think about it, remember when Obi-wan Kenobi tells Luke that the blast points on the Jawa’s sand crawler are “too accurate for sand people” and could “only be made by storm troopers?”

Well, the storm troopers, as accurate as they were regarded to be, couldn’t come near hitting the side of a Millennium Falcon when shooting at a man, boy, princess and a couple of droids when it came time to prove their marksmanship!

Humor is a great way to reach customers and prospects. Whether it’s on a large format mural, a direct mailing or a promotional desk calendar for your business, R and R Images can give you the best printing and service and hit the target better than, dare we say… an accurate storm trooper? May the force of great printing be with you!

The intriguingly named Scribblitt is a website for children to explore their creativity through writing and illustrating. Users are able to write full stories and add their own artwork to them. In addition to the writing tools, Scribblitt provides a planning tool to help kids organize their thoughts and outline their stories before starting the writing process. When a story is complete, Scribblitt allows users to order a professionally printed and bound book.

Of course, the printing process is where we come in. Putting text and illustrations on paper is no different than printing photos books, so we are able to support Scribblitt’s story printing services with our in-house equipment. As we do with other clients, we handle the complete order fulfillment process, from printing and binding to shipping the book.

We’re happy to be working with a business like Scribblitt. It’s fun for us to see innovative new companies using web technologies in new ways and we’re glad we can do our part to support them with our printing expertise.

With just a simple photo and the distort function in Photoshop, those printed mailers and direct mail pieces garner a second look, double-take from those who see it laying flat on a desk or table… or is it flat? Sell real estate that towers above all other mail, cars ready to drive off the card, little spokespeople or animals that are ready to jump out at you.

With a little imagination, you can make printed pieces that people will keep and show others just for the “cool factor.” Isn’t that really what you want people to do with your marketing message?

When you’re ready to produce the 3D masterpieces, come to R and R Images and get fine art quality printing at 2D prices! Not only can we print your piece, our in-house design team can make your 2D 3D concept a reality and we can handle the details of managing your direct mail campaign. Just bring us your direct mail idea and we’ll provide the expertise!

We appreciate all of you who read this blog and who follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Also, we’re grateful for all of our longtime clients and for the new customers we’ve begun working with over the summer. The fall and holiday season are shaping up to be our busiest season yet, but we look forward to the challenge!

Everyone be safe and have fun this weekend. We’ll see you next week!

While we’re on the topic of being busy, we’re also preparing for the holiday season, a time which is always the busiest for us. Thanks to the increase in photo product printing, we have to scale up our operation to meet the demand. In order to streamline our workflow and increase throughput, we just installed two additional HP Indigo printers. We estimate that this will provide a 50% increase in total capacity on our print floor, and we can’t wait to use all of it in the fourth quarter!

So thank you to all of our customers, both long-time friends and new clients. We’re proud to work with all of you and we thank you for helping us to buck the slow economy and grow through these times.

Why are we discussing all of this? To explain the recognition award pictured below, of course! Rod and the rest of the board members received these crystal globes to recognize all of the exceptional work they have contributed to Dscoop and the printing industry.

Rod extends his thanks to the Dscoop community and is pleased that he continues to work with fantastic people from across the printing world.

Thanks to Patrick Darby of Tonic Photo Studios for the photograph.