
Jim Niemiec, Jim Niemiec Consulting, LLC
Consultant, Paper and Graphic Arts Industries
Jim is a recognized industry leader in paper product and business development with technical expertise and global experience in digital and conventional printing, coated paper, printing inks, technical marketing and intellectual property.
Over the last 20 years Jim was product development lead for digital printing papers at Consolidated Papers, Stora Enso North America, NewPage and most recently Verso Corporation, based at the R&D and Technical Center in Wisconsin Rapids. He was involved in development of several coated paper grade lines for dry and liquid toner electrophotographic printing, as well as coated inkjet paper product lines – one of which received a Printing Industries of America InterTech Award in 2011 for its contribution to the advancement of the printing industry.
Earlier accomplishments which round out his 44 years of experience include development and improvement of coated and uncoated offset and rotogravure papers for publication, commercial, packaging and specialty papers as well as formulation of rotogravure printing inks.
Jim was TAPPI PaperCon 2016 Steering Committee Chair and past Chair of the Coating and Graphic Arts Division, Technical Program, and Printing and Converting Committees. At TAPPI conferences, he has organized numerous technical panels and short courses on laser and inkjet printing, conventional printing technologies and the future of print technology. He is currently a member of the Editorial Board of the TAPPI Journal as well as the Coating and Graphic Arts Technical Program Committee, Printing and Converting Committee, Coating Fundamentals Committee and Division Awards Committee. He is also a regular presenter at NAPIM’s annual Summer Printing Ink Course and frequently presents at Cal Poly’s International Graphic Communication Week and other various conferences, training courses and events related to print and paper technology.
After graduating from RIT with a BS in Printing Technology, Jim’s career began as a printing ink chemist at Inmont Corporation and continued in the paper industry serving in R&D, product and business development roles at Abitibi-Price, Fraser Papers, Consolidated Papers, Stora Enso, NewPage and Verso Corporation. Jim also earned a Bachelor of Commerce degree from York University and an MBA from Lakeland College and holds several patents involving printing technology including inkjet papers.
In 2012, Jim was elected to the Gravure Association of the Americas’ Gravure Cylinder Society which “recognizes individuals who have rendered outstanding or extraordinary contributions to the gravure industry” and the association. Jim also received the TAPPI Coating and Graphic Arts Division’s Leadership and Service Award and the DuPont Soy Polymers Prize in 2015.In 2017 he was elected TAPPI Fellow “in recognition of meritorious service to the Association and the industry."
Nancy Plowman Sandreuter
President, Nancy Plowman Associates, Inc.
Nancy is recognized expert in the printing/paper field, speaking at many events for clubs and organizations such as TAPPI, NAPIM, RIT, GATF, RPTA and the R&E Research Council.
She is a graduate of the University of Maine with a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics, and a minor in Chemistry. She worked with the S. D. Warren Paper Company, a Printing Paper Subsidiary of Scott Paper Company for 17 years. About half that time was spent in coating research, and the latter part of that time in the Graphic Arts testing group. After resigning from Warren, she joined Acme Printing Company, a commercial web and sheet fed offset printer.
Nancy Plowman Associates (NPA) was incorporated in 1986. It is a graphic arts testing and consulting service specializing in handling print production related problem, including analysis of all components of the offset printing process. Examples of these include inks, papers, aqueous and UV coatings, adhesives, fountain solutions, blankets and chemical additives to the printing system.
NPA has developed own line of print testing equipment and has worked with and assisted major paper companies in setting up new in-house testing facilities and procedures to test ink and paper in a production environment.
Nancy has authored nearly a hundred articles in trade magazines, as well as numerous published papers for TAPPI. She is a contributing editor for Converting Magazine and Graphic Arts Monthly. She organized the first TAPPI Print Quality Symposium in 2004, which was repeated and co-chairs the TAPPI Advanced Printing Courses. She is a longtime member of the Technical Program Committee for the Annual TAPPI PaperCon Coating Conferences and was honored in 2018 as a TAPPI Fellow.
Victor J. Lewis, National Technical Manager
PRISCO, Printers' Service Company
A graduate of Drexel University with a BS in Organic Chemistry, Mr. Lewis began his business career in 1969 with what was then the DuPont Company.
Over the next sixteen years he held a variety of technical service and production positions for companies producing colored organic and inorganic, black and white pigments.
He then spent seven years in the printing ink industry, holding laboratory, research and production management positions for firms making news, heatset publication, sheetfed and fluid packaging inks.
Since 1993 he has been National Technical Service Manager for Printers’ Service, a major supplier of pressroom consumables to the offset printing industry. Duties include supervising a force of 13 technical representatives as well as extensive national and international travel, public speaking and customer contact.