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Douglas Holmes, who started a career in binding in 1950, passed away peacefully with family by his side Thursday morning. He was 81. Holmes's son, Bob Holmes, was reached at Holmes The Finishing House in Markham to speak about his father. "He was an incredible leader in the industry," he said. Douglas Holmes

The Dead Tree Edition — a blog that provides analysis "and smart-aleck comments" related to the production of publications in the U.S. — is suggesting an open marriage with print. The Jan. 26 post entitled Dear Print, We Print Buyers Now Want an Open Marriage was written as a rebuttal of sorts — according to a post on WhatTheyThink.com — to an article about the rapid market climb of e-reading, citing a report from the Book Industry Study Group.

Manroland's sheetfed business has found an investor in Langley Holdings of Nottinghamshire, England, according to a press release posted on whattheythink.com today. Langley Holdings is a privately-owned engineering group. The takeover involves the sheet fed printing equipment division and production facilities (including all real estate in Offenbach, Germany).

Catalyst Paper in Richmond, B.C. is filing for creditor protection while restructuring, but it will be business as usual through the process, according to the company.  "The operations of Catalyst and its subsidiaries are intended to continue as usual and obligations to employees and suppliers during the restructuring process are expected to be met in the ordinary course," reads a release on the paper manufacturer's website.

The Canadian Business Press (CBP) is flexing the power of print by helping publishers and others spread that message for free. Trish Torrance, the CBP's executive director, said about a year of work went into the Power of Print: Healthy for Business campaign, which started with a committee discussing ideas and then passing them on to creative firm Hambly and Woolley in Toronto to create the components. "I am so thrilled by how it came out," she said of the ads. One of the power of print ads from CBP

A Masthead analysis of ABC circulation figures suggests Canada Post is losing mail volumes faster than overall industry circulation declines as publishers increasingly turn to other distribution channels including single-copy sales, bulk distribution and newspaper inserts. In the last five years (June 2006 - June 2011), overall magazine circulation has declined 10.7% among ABC member magazines. (Not all magazines are declining.) But the volume of magazine distribution through mailed subscriptions has declined 18%. The volume of magazine circulation through other methods has actually increased 3.1%. The results were recently presented at a Toronto chapter meeting of the National Association of Major Mail Users.

Dejong Printing has installed a new Komori LSX 629 press with coater, bought from K-North. Dejong offers prepress, offset printing and finishing services. Don Turner and Alex Dandajena of Dejong

St. Thomas Printing, a family-owned commercial printing business, recently purchased a new Polar 66 cutter at the Graphics Canada show. The company was established in 1990 and has since been servicing the London, St. Thomas and Talbotville area. With the new cutter is Mark Groeneweg of St. Thomas Printing

Former film giant Eastman Kodak has filed for bankruptcy protection, according to a story in the New York Times today. Citigroup is reportedly providing Kodak $950 million in financing to allow the company to continue operating through the bankruptcy. Kodak is looking to sell off its 1,100 digital patents in the meantime. “Kodak is taking a significant step toward enabling our enterprise to complete its transformation,” said Antonio Perez, chairman and chief executive officer, in a news release on the company's website. “At the same time as we have created our digital business, we have also already effectively exited certain traditional operations, closing 13 manufacturing plants and 130 processing labs, and reducing our workforce by 47,000 since 2003. Now we must complete the transformation by further addressing our cost structure and effectively monetizing non-core IP assets. We look forward to working with our stakeholders to emerge a lean, world-class, digital imaging and materials science company.”

Bloomberg is reporting today that industrial conglomerate Possehl & Co. based in Lübeck, Germany has bought Manroland's web press unit in Augsburg, but investors are still being sought for operations in Offenbach and Plauen. The latter sites will initially be taken over by management, insolvency administrator Werner Schneider told Bloomberg.

A press release issued yesterday explains troubled press manufacturer Manroland is very close to being sold. "Negotiations are in the final stages for the sale of Manroland AG as part of the company's insolvency proceedings," reads the release from its insolvency administrator.

The Jan. 16, 2012 edition of Marketing magazine presents interesting data on ad spending for this year, particularly for print media. The Marketing 2012 Outlook Survey Readership Study consulted 120 industry professionals for their thoughts, including biggest business concerns (one was world financial collapse) and plans for social media marketing this year (72 percent expect to increase time and resources devoted to it).

Webcom is doubling its inkjet capacity with an $8 million investment, it announced today. The latest investment is an HP T350 Colour Inkjet Web Press to complement the HP T300 installed just over a year ago. PrintCAN was on hand during a Webcom open house at that time to see the first HP addition for the printer's BookFWD program.

October was a strong month for exports, rising 4.7 per cent from October 2010 to $86.8 million, a rebound from a weaker September that saw an 18% drop in exports from a year previous. However, 2011 exports up until October total around $754 million, down from about $802 million during the same time period in 2010. Meanwhile, imports fell somewhat from September, while the trade balance fell further into the negative. All countries October 2011 October 2010 % Change Total exports ($M) 86.8 82.9 +4.7 Total imports ($M) 113.5 120.5 -6.2 Trade balance (YTD) -284.8 -274.5 -3.7

Canada Post's unionized rural and suburban mail carriers (RSMC) are now working without a contract, according to the postal union's spokeswoman. Aalya Ahmad said about 7,000 carriers who deliver to boxes in communities outside major cities (e.g. Kanata and Orleans in the Ottawa area) had an eight-year contract that expired on Jan. 1 of this year.