Joe Upton is the Vice President of Business Development at Gasch Printing, a leading digital book printing company based in Odenton, Maryland. With decades of experience in the printing industry, Joe has a rich background spanning traditional offset printing to cutting-edge digital solutions. His career journey includes a significant tenure at Molloy Lithographing, a family-run business, and later at Edwards Brothers, one of the oldest book printers in the U.S. Today, Joe leverages his expertise to help publishers optimize production, reduce waste, and adapt to the evolving demands of the modern publishing landscape.
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Chris Santomasimo: I’m excited to sit down today with Joe Upton. Joe is the Vice President of Business Development at Gash Printing, which is based in Odenton, Maryland. So welcome to the podcast, Joe.
Joe Upton: Well, thank you for having me, Chris. I enjoy this opportunity to visit with you.
Chris Santomasimo: That’s terrific. I had the pleasure of sitting down with you and breaking bread at the Book Manufacturers Institute meeting earlier this week. For those who aren’t familiar with BMI, it’s a great organization of book printers, publishers, and suppliers to that industry. Joe is one of the members, as am I. It was nice to be able to take a pulse on what’s going on with the printing industry as it applies to books, of course, and to see what folks are talking about in the market dynamics.
Joe Upton: Yeah, BMI is a pretty neat organization. I’ve been a part of one similar to it because the book industry is not a big industry. There were about 100 people at that meeting, a mix of book printers and suppliers. It’s a very collegial group, as you commented—very open, even though there are many competitors on both the supplier and printer sides. But I think everybody views that if we’re open and honest about what’s going on in the market, the challenges we face, we’re better off working as a group, as opposed to trying to knock each other’s brains out.
Chris Santomasimo: It’s absolutely true. What’s interesting about the industry, too, and I think the attendance of the meeting reflects this, is that you’ve got some really big players, smaller ones, and folks in the middle. But they all sort of swim together in an effort to preserve themselves, as you said.
Joe Upton: Yes. We had the top executives from CJK and Lakeside sitting next to the top executives of companies like Gash, all operating as peers. There’s really no differentiation by size. I was joking with the Thomson Reuters folks who own Westlaw and West Publishing. I think I spent quite a bit of money with them back in the day when I was a law student. It’s finally nice to meet the people who took my money.
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