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Introduction This report from the Center for Competitive Analysis (CCA) of the University of Missouri is intended to provide basic background information about the Lithography and Commercial Printing (LCP) industry. This industry is designated Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) code 2752, which includes most of the items in North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes 323110 and 323114. Subindustries included in these two NAICS codes but not in SIC code 2752 are book printing (NAICS 323110/SIC 2732); card printing, including business cards, playing cards, greeting cards, trading cards, and postcards (NAICS 323110/SIC 2771); and photocopying and duplicating (NAICS 323114/SIC 7334). Generally speaking, this industry provides lithographic (offset) printing services on a job order basis, using purchased stock such as stationery, letterhead, invitations, labels, and similar items. The broad industry includes all printers that produce commercial products on a custom basis: annual reports, business cards, stock certificates, menus, advertising materials, labels, posters, calendars, and maps. Since other businesses are by far the industry’s most frequent customers, printers benefit from an economy that generates many new business formations, resulting in a significant demand for a variety of products such as catalogs, trade advertising, forms, labels, signs, and financial and legal materials. Lithography accounts for about half of the printing done in the U.S. The central topic of this report is lithography, but other printing processes will be discussed because they are close substitutes (from the customer’s perspective) and because all “traditional” processes are being affected by advances in digital printing technologies. This industry, defined according to SIC code 2752, had 783 firms in Missouri during the first half of 1998, employing slightly over ten thousand persons. Under a broader definition of “the print market,” used in the 1998 Print Market Atlas, Missouri had 1,114 firms in 1997, employing 21,027 persons and shipping over $2.7 billion in output. In 1992, the national employment level in SIC code 2752 was about 440,000, which represented a five-year total increase of approximately 9%. Using the broader definition, the “commercial printing” industry employed approximately 573,000 persons in the U.S. at the end of 1997, making this industry the fourth largest employer among manufacturing industries, behind motor vehicles and equipment, miscellaneous plastics