A day in the life of Govind Bhargava

When you read your early morning newspaper, besides half tones and colour reproduction you look for...
I keenly look for development work/projects that are coming up in my city, state and country.

When and how do you begin your day?
I begin my day early with yoga.

Do you plan your day, meticulously? Or is it ad hoc? Or is there a blueprint for the day?
I plan my day in the morning while having tea, taking care of phone calls and ad hoc matters. Such planning acts as a guiding thread for me for the day.

One person with whom you like to share your daily drive to office. Why?
Sharing daily drive with any young printing technocrat/entrepreneur would be interesting so as to listen to his/her ideas and views. 

What’s the first thing you do on entering the office?
After obeisance to almighty, I relook at my schedule for the day for taking up tasks as planned.

How frequently do you interact with print production supervisors? What do you discuss, commonly?
I normally interact with my print supervisor on every Tuesday and Friday, the topics of discussion are performance of the last three days, then planning for the week ahead and on how to focus on quality, consistency and production.

With the fierce competition, high cost of entry and above all, the increasing threat from other media, do you find that traditional ink-on-paper is facing a serious threat to its survival?
Fierce competition is keeping presses very alert, probably because of excess capacities and slowdown. But, printing and packaging segment is growing faster than GDP rate of India, I don’t see any threat, but one has to be a bit innovative.

Which press does the best printing in India? And why?
There is not one but many presses doing very good work. I even appreciate a small screen printing house doing good work by practicing systematic working.

How do you rate your press as compared to leading printers the world-over?
Miles to go…

If you won Rs 10 crore through Playwin which printing equipment would you invest in? Why?
Sophisticated embellishment machines to have an edge over others.

The best break-through in print technology in the past hundred years?
It has to be CTP. Now it takes one person to do the same work in few minutes and send for digital print or CTP. I think computerisation (DTP) has changed things a lot.

Your favourite adda? Or paan? Also which is your cell phone? Pen? Car? Wrist watch?
Never got hooked to any addabazi. Blackberry, Fiat Linea, Titan

For a working lunch if you met Johanes Gutenberg (the father of modern printing), what would you talk to him about?
Although his invention of Letterpress printing is still very dominant in form of flexo and label printing, I would ask him, if there could have been a way to avoid demise of conventional letterpress printing.

How do you motivate your sales and marketing team? Any new promotion strategy?
By reminding them of potential market areas and motivating them to achieve their targets and also to become entitled for incentives.

The most frequently used mantra in your organisation. Your corporate philosophy.
Proper planning is most important for achieving any goal. We encourage all the managers to make plans to achieve better performance and results.

The craziest deadline, you've come across?
Many years back, when we had to print four four-colour sets of 1,000 each, in 10 hours, when we had just installed a single-colour offset machine.

Your favourite excuse to your family when you’re late?
Now they know very well that it is either a breakdown or some special new job.

Has the domination of the printing industry reached a plateau with the arrival of new competitors?
Maybe ‘yes’ for commercial printing and ‘no’ for packaging and labels.

Please comment of the technology and machines (press / pre-press / post-press / others) that you have invested in, in the past few years?
We installed a six-colour plus coater Heidelberg SM 102 CP Tronic machine – it’s a work horse but needs a lot to feed.

In India, the two most important barriers are technology and cost. What advise do you have for the printer?
Use technology, earn. Then invest in new technology again.

How do you stay in touch with technological developments? In this sense, please comment on your official view on CTP technology and digital printing.
Print-promotion newsletter. Then Indian print magazines and technical seminars are helpful, to keep up with the technology. CTP is fast going to wipe out other options of platemaking. Digital printing will slowly progress and maintain a high growth rate.

One person with whom you would like to have a face to face.
Arnab Goswami – on some subjects that I don’t agree with him.