Power Print is an award winning top print service provider in Dubai. Zahir Hassan has been running the company successfully since 2004. The company offers a wide variety of print jobs including brochures, catalogues, point of sale material, merchandising packaging, promo boxes, carrier bags and much more. The company also handles overseas printing projects.
The company is very well known for the quality of products they offer. However, like many other printing companies in the region Power Print has been affected by Covid-19. In order to find out how a successful commercial printer in Dubai dealt with the pandemic we talked to Zahir Hassan. Here are the excerpts:
What measures have you taken in order to protect your employees while still managing day to day activities of the print house?
Employees are made aware of current tough market situation in the aftermath of pandemic which requires a different approach where in survival is the key. With this view point every employee is made to understand that their basic necessities of living along with their dependents are only to be prioritized. Once they were convinced of this scenario they were asked to accept revised salary structure along with reduced working hours.
In which way does the Corona virus affect your business?
Reduced business and its subsequent impact on day to day operation of the company. Dubai’s economy is tourism driven. The sharp decline in tourism due to pandemic have dented its economy to a great extent. Nevertheless, I am positive that it is a temporary phenomenon as authorities here are very much watchful about the business conditions with effective precautionary and corrective measures to curtail this adverse impact.
Last time we spoke you said you were planning to invest more in packaging printing equipment, have you installed packaging printing production equipment recently?
As packaging is the only future for printing industry,diversifying in to this segment is the best solution for Power Print to continue providing print related services to the market. We have recently inducted a box making machine whereby we increased our production capacity for hard case boxes to a greater extent. As Power Print believes in impactful printing we are trying to establish a niche market wherein bespoke packaging is serviced.
Do you think the pandemic will force or encourage printers to opt for more automation and rely less on manual labour?
Automation has been a priority for printers since long as it would give multiple benefits in the form of quality and quantity which are driving forces behind a successful printing business operations. Pandemic made printers to realize its importance and somewhat force them to adopt this in to their business.
Do you believe the Corona pandemic which it appears to be with us for some time will change the media landscape in Dubai?
Dubai has resilience to confront any tough situation that jeopardize the business environment. We have witnessed this in the past and this pandemic too would succumb to Dubai’s tough combating measures.
Are you relying more on the Internet for receiving and processing orders?
Internet is present and future way of living. As such physical interaction is limited and is widely being replaced with virtual transaction methods. Internet is faster, cost effective and flawless hence it definitely is the way forward.
Have you reduced your work force because of pandemic?
Yes, mostly in back office area. It is long overdue as most of our back office work is automated and to some extent subcontracted. As for the production we have fine-tuned our workforce with close watch on machine operators and is being focused on replacing manual workforce with slow integration of automation in to the production process system.
What is your plan for future investment? Which area of printing do you believe has more potential for investment?
As our focus is on building bespoke packaging we will focus more on to integrating digital and offset to achieve our target products. This would be implemented both in printing and post press segments.
