During a presentation to RIT faculty, staff, and students lead an open discussion on what it means to truly be a green company and the overall benefits that a green company receives from aiding the environment.

While many people picture Green companies as granola eating, Birkenstock wearing, tree huggers they often don’t picture printing companies as fitting the bill. I mean printing companies need paper, paper comes from tress, and cutting down tress hurts the environment right? However, as explained by the Pictorial Offset Corporation the move to Green had environmental impacts but was done almost purely as a business move to increase company revenue.

Pictorial Offset Corporation explained how the company first met its original ISO standard and was the first company in the world to earn duel ISO (International Organization for Standardization) in quality and environmental process control. Pictorial Offset Corporation was also the first commercial printer to offer FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) certified paper sheets as an option to its clients. FSC certified paper comes from forests harvested in a sustainable manner and are processed in FSC – certified mills. To date Pictorial Offset Corporation is ISO 14001 certified in doing business in an environmentally sustainable manner and ISO 9001 certified in quality compliance. They are also the first printer in the world to earn The Conservation Fund’s Carbon Neutral status in 2006 for reforestation by planting 5,000 trees in the Edwin B. Forsythe national Wildlife Refuge to offset the company’s carbon emission. Pictorial Offset Corporation was also named a Global Sustainability Trendsetter by The Rainforest Alliance and awarded SmartWood Certification.

Pictorial Offset Corporation has also been an Environment Protect Agency Performance Track Member since 2006 and was the first commercial printer in the world to be certified with the Sustainable Forestry Initiative. By reaching these government standards all products printed with Pictorial Offset Corporation have the option of containing various logos that certify any company using them as a printer as a Green friendly company. By doing this Pictorial Offset Corporation was offered a larger clientele base of Green friendly customers and those wishing to become Green friendly.

Now you may be thinking a printing company that is Green friendly must have the ugliest, poorest quality inventory that looks more like shredded wheat then real paper. You would be wrong. During the presentation various job samples created by the company were passed around and not only was the paper quality excellent but the documents themselves were vibrant and eye catching.

For more information on Pictorial Offset Corporation you can visit their website at www.pictirialoffset.com

The Open Publishing Lab (or OPL for short) is a new research group based out of the School of Print, where students and faculty from all over campus work together to create new publishing applications and tools.

And it finally has a physical home!

Over break OPL students and faculty worked to renovate the Kodak Approval space* located next to the SPM student lounge. In less than two days, they applied multiple coats of paint to the walls, and assembled and moved in all the furniture (with the help of a pickup truck and a Subaru Outback). The space was ready on the first day of classes, just in time to start working on projects for the RIT Innovation Festival coming up on May 3rd. More on that as we get closer to it — we promise that SPM will have a strong presence there!

* - the Approval’s still at the school, just in a new location