Set in the shadow of one of the UK’s highest peaks, Pen y Fan, The Print Shop operates from the beautiful village of Brecon on the edge of Wales’ Brecon Beacons National Park.
Apprenticed as a screen printer at 16, its founder Albert Keane is a bold pioneer in creating a new type of business model that seems set to shake things up for the visual communications industry. With this successful present in view, it is important to understand the journey that Keane has been on and the lessons he has learnt along the way.
The full twelve rounds
Albert Keane is a passionate believer in
providing the opportunity for young people
and those who have to cope with a disability
to learn tangible skills to help them into work
By the time he was 22 Keane had earnt his spurs as an apprentice and, with contacts built up over the years, he branched out and started his first screen printing business in the cellar of his aunt’s basement. Using a process that would now be considered arcane by most wide-format printer equipped businesses, the product he was creating saw artwork applied to glass panels for the gaming machine industry.
Ten years on and by 1981 Keane had built up a booming business with an unforeseen Achilles’ heel; it was over reliant one one major customer, which went bust and took his business with it.
Climbing back off the canvas, Keane spent a further twelve years building up his screen printing business to a peak, which saw two factories and 25 employees in constant operation. But storm clouds gathered once again as a recession, new legislation that drastically curtailed the scope of the gaming machine industry, and the wide-format digital print technology boom knocked him back down once again.
You need complete integrity in what you do, treat your suppliers as you want your customers to treat you. You can’t be a good supplier if you don’t have good suppliers”
Talking to Print Monthly as his new 1.6m Infinti FinaUV160+ wide-format hybrid printer had just been settled into its new home, Keane explains: “The company went bust because we had grown to a good size and as a business we just could not respond quickly enough because of that scale,” he pauses in deep thought before adding: “A larger company is better off having components, with each seen as a profit centre, so you can cut them away if it doesn’t work.”
The next 17 years would see him draw on all his knowledge as a screen printer to redevelop his business from the ground up, diversifying into trade printing for sign-makers with an investment in a Roland DG Versa-CAMM, and also providing a specialised service for printing estate agents boards. By 2010 he had moved to a small industrial unit with a high-street retail arm, which in October 2012 was transformed into The Print Shop and set-up as a full sign-making and digital print-service-provider.
Spanning the spectrum of the modern visual communications industry, his current services range allows Keane to say ‘yes’ to his customers, but also allows him to remain flexible as market demand rises and falls.
Calling Inspector Gadget
The Print Shop is located in the Welsh town of Brecon, nestled in the Brecon
Beacons National Park. Pictured: The view down towards Brecon from the summit
of Pen y Fan
Keane confesses to being something of an Inspector Gadget figure when it comes to his approach to finding technology solutions for his production processes. Indeed, rewinding back to the period of his second business, he explains that a tie up with major supplier Sericol saw him become an early pioneer for the system of printing onto graphics film and then applying this to glass for gaming machines, rather than direct screen printing—sound familiar?
Keane explains: “It should have made me a multi-millionaire, but it was just too radical. Instead of five printing stations each processing one panel, all screen printers needed was one larger station for applying and cutting graphics. This meant they could reduce their outgoings by as much as 50 percent and halved the price of a printed glass panel.
Date founded: 1971”
Keane came within touching distance of serious prosperity when the biggest gaming machine manufacturer in the UK bought into the system. But its six month trial test came undone when a competitor, knowing he could not compete, reacted by selling out to JPM and removing the need for his then revolutionary system.
This passion for invention has remained at the core of Keane’s career, as he outlines: “I recently realised I did not need my carousel screen printer with the addition of the Infinti and demand growing for wide-format print from my customer base. So, I changed things around and built a single screen printing unit myself, which can do all the work I need in this area. It’s about being a service business that can flex as need requires, rather than a retail business that gets bogged down in shifting stock.”
Area of production space: 1,000sq ft”
Indeed, a recent enquiry that came through from a customer in a separate area of the business saw Keane invest in a new Konica Minolta and finishing systems, and he now produces 500 bound and colour-coded diaries a month for a local social-care services provider.
The next phase
Any guesses? Pictured: Graphics film punches for creating image transfers for
applying graphics to glass
Keane has impressive ambitions for The Print Shop and, explaining that he is a member of world religion the Bahai Faith, he explains: “I have two young people who I mentor that have to cope with disabilities that have been a barrier to their confidence. Being a Bahai I want to help them fulfil their potential and be able to succeed by passing on all the knowledge I have gained over the years. An important part of this is highlighting that the most important thing in business, as in life, is respect for others.”
Keane continues: “You need complete integrity in what you do, treat your suppliers as you want your customers to treat you. You can’t be a good supplier if you don’t have good suppliers. It is also important to work hard at everything that is produced, don’t see a customer just as a job, work in partnership with them, ask what else you can do, how you can make things better. I also encourage feedback and constructive criticism, as if they are unhappy with something they could walk away and you will never no why or have an opportunity to change it.”
Age Albert Keane apprenticed as a screen printer: 16”
Keane counsels that the single most important lesson he has learnt since his he started out at 22 is to avoid basing the design and scope of projects on the ‘how much?’ question.
“If you act like a supermarket then you will get people basing their decisions on price and nothing else. You need to try and get the customer to explain what challenges they face and goals they want to achieve, and then suggest the best ways to address them.”
Looking to the future and Keane has his Inspector Gadget trilby on again and is on the verge of launching an e-commerce website that is fed by a network of designers and sees him able to take art and graphics and apply them into whatever physical product the customer desires—from mugs and hoodies, to vehicles and canvas bags.
Number of staff: 4”
“The designers get a royalty on every purchase; I am not interfering with their market, they get a marketing opportunity and revenue stream; I as the printer have amazing product opportunities and the site management company makes it all run harmoniously.”
A goldmine of colourful anecdotes, Keane concludes in his own style by explaining where the inspiration came from: “I was at an exhibition and saw a designer who had mocked up some examples of her work onto mugs. One said: ‘I have got 2150 friends on Facebook and no-one to shag.’ It made me laugh and it hit me that we as print-service-providers need to tap into that creativity; don’t try to bypass it.”
