Engage360 Video Summary of Industry-Leading Key Insights and Strategies
Engage360 held in Orlando, Florida on October 21, 2025 was the Gimbel & Associates and Crawford Technologies inaugural event, created to carry forward the spirit of education, collaboration, and innovation that has long been at the heart of our industry. The days sessions were designed to advance our field by sharing expertise, inspiring new ideas, and fostering meaningful connections that help us navigate an ever-changing landscape. We are deeply grateful to our distinguished speakers and to the many partners and colleagues whose hard work made Engage360 possible. Recordings and presentations from Engage360 are made available here so you can revisit and share the insights from this important gathering.
Ernie Crawford opens by thanking attendees for coming and expressing his excitement about the strong lineup of speakers and the partnership between Crawford Technologies and Gimbel & Associates. Roger P. Gimbel EDP and President of Gimbel & Associates, then reflects on how the industry has evolved from events like Graph Expo to PRINTING United. Recognizing the deep legacy and long-standing relationships in the room, Roger emphasizes the urgent need to attract and develop younger talent, including through scholarships. He explains that the speaker program was designed to deliver practical ideas attendees can apply in their businesses and thanks the speakers for sharing their expertise.
Curious how to make AI actually work for your team—without the hype? In this lively, interactive talk, an ex-FBI technologist breaks down why most organizations aren’t seeing results yet and shows the three practical ways to implement AI now: sharing knowledge, generating content, and turning data into usable insight. You’ll hear candid stories (good and bad), see real wins like auto-creating thousands of product descriptions, learn why “human-first and last” matters, and get a simple leadership playbook to avoid BYO-AI risks and vendor lock-in. It’s fast, funny, and refreshingly non-technical—perfect for executives and practitioners who want outcomes. Download the presentationWide Format Reimagined: Automation, AI, and a Path to Sustainable GrowthStephen R. Webster, Director of Professional and Industrial Services at Ricoh USASteven Webster highlights how AI, automation, and robotics—especially in wide-format print—are now essential tools for driving top-line revenue and future-proofing print businesses. Against a backdrop of an aging workforce, underused equipment, and fragmented software, he shows how integrated automation can dramatically cut setup time, unlock capacity, and improve sustainability, citing examples where 40 hours of work were reduced to minutes. He stresses that real ROI comes from efficiency and throughput, not labor cuts, and that automation should upskill and redeploy existing employees instead of replacing them. His core message: AI-enabled automation is no longer optional—it’s a strategic necessity to stay competitive and meet evolving customer demands. Download the presentation
David Hunter argues that color in print can’t be left to opinion—it must be measured and controlled. He explains that while G7 creates a shared visual appearance, it doesn’t tell you how close a print is to the target or whether it’s truly “sellable.” Using the E-Factor metric, he shows how printers can define acceptable color, reduce waste, and improve profitability across six key trends: sustainability, digital printing (especially inkjet), AI and automation, brand conformance, packaging, and consolidation. With dashboards, KPIs, and automated measurement, shops can align operators, managers, and sales on clear expectations, compare devices and substrates, better serve brand owners, and avoid the costly cycle of rework and unhappy customers. Download the presentation
Nathan Safran and Lisa Cross explain that Printing United Alliance Insights (formerly NAPCO Research) provides ongoing industry research on economics, wages, convergence, automation, inkjet, and AI to help print providers navigate a challenging, cost-pressured market. Lisa highlights their “triangle of transformation” (digital workflow, digital printing, and digital media, now supercharged by AI), show how shops are automating, adopting inkjet, expanding into new segments, and using portals and omnichannel communications to meet changing buyer expectations. She closes by urging printers to treat AI and automation as strategic necessities, explore adjacent markets, and use Printing United Expo—especially the new AI pavilion and Alliance research—as a roadmap for innovation and growth. Download the presentation
Alan Burger explains how “interactive documents” are the next evolution in customer communications—responsive, compliant digital documents that feel like a website, work on any device, reuse existing digital assets, and provide rich analytics on how customers engage. He shows how generative AI and agents can now auto-build these complex, regulated templates from existing PDFs, brand rules, and industry knowledge, cutting setup time and cost dramatically while still keeping humans in control for compliance and fine-tuning. Working with partners like OSG and Journey Connect, his goal is to help organizations move beyond static PDFs. Download the presentation
This presentation shows how Amazon builds a culture of innovation by “working backwards” from the customer and reinforcing four pillars: architecture, organization, culture, and mechanisms. It explains how Amazon’s Leadership Principles guide everyday decisions, how teams use artifacts like press releases and FAQs before building solutions, and how a flexible architecture lets them “think big, start small, scale fast.” It ends by emphasizing that failure and invention go hand in hand, and real innovation requires experimentation with uncertain outcomes. Download the presentation
Please note: Due to their proprietary nature, select videos and presentations are not available for display on this website or for release.