Plan to Prepare.
‘If yer not preparin’ to win, yer last’ – Benjamin Bobby. Or was it Ricky Franklin. History is hard. But it’s full of lessons, which is excellent for the people of earth so we can learn from that and not just from our own mistakes. At Printed Threads, we have a pretty awesome system set up for our press operators to succeed in their schedule. The idea is simple, it’s the execution that must be thorough, and daily. We have four presses, so as screens come out of our screen room to be developed, we have eight carts. Each Press gets two carts. One for the first half of the day, and one for the second half. These carts contain all the screens they need, set up in the order they are scheduled. Atop the carts, we place every ink they will need during the day, along with squeegees and flood bars. This ensures that the only time they have to spend away from their beloved ROQ Press is only when art approval is required for a job (which is every job). This also helps us plan for the curve balls a day can throw you because you can physically adjust the schedule to meet unexpected rush orders and you can also have a physical representation of gear on the floor. All used screens and inks are placed in a reclaim cart to not dirty up the pre-press carts. Everything pre-press is nice and shiny, everything post press is left to be tidied up. If you fail to plan, then you’re planning to fail.