Home | Subscribe | Contact Us | Advertise Home | Subscribe | Contact Us | Advertise
President’s Award winner Roy V. Flesh II shares his memories and his hopes for the printing industry The President’s Award recognizes an individual who has made a significant contribution to the business printing industry and to the independent concept. Here is a profile of the 2007 President’s Award Winner Roy V. Flesh II, CEO of The Flesh Company, St. Louis. Flesh received his award in May during a ceremony held at the DMIA Spring Management Technology Conference in Palm Springs, Calif.
While most third graders in the 1950s set up lemonade stands or cut grass to make a few extra quarters, one industrious, young tyke in Missouri offered printing services instead.
Roy V. Flesh II, CEO of The Flesh Company, St. Louis, said he was about 9 years old when he started printing and selling personalized cocktail napkins. His dad, former DMIA president Royal S. “Scud” Flesh, gave him a heat embosser for the project and his mother, Annie, was his typesetter. “I couldn’t spell that well at the time so she had to do it for me,” he says with a laugh. “My parents were great salespeople. They helped me to sell it to all of their friends.”
Roy continued to print napkins throughout his childhood and his teenage years. “I bought a horse with the money I made from printing those napkins, and my first car,” he says. “It was a 1954 Studebaker Champion. I got it in 1966.”
Starting a printing career before high school might be out of the ordinary, but it made sense for Roy. For almost 100 years the Flesh family has been in the printing business. The family odyssey began in 1913 when Roy’s grandfather, Roy V. “R.V.” Flesh, founded The Flesh Company.
“The Flesh Company would not be around if my grandfather did not have such a passion for baseball,” Roy admits. In 1913, R.V. closed a big print sale and decided to celebrate his achievement by cutting the workday short and heading to a St. Louis Cardinals ball game. The next day, when he returned to the office, R.V.’s boss “kind of chewed him out about it. So that’s when he decided to go out on his own and start his own business,” Roy says.
Roy officially entered the family business in 1970, not too long after he married his wife, Joan, and only three days after he graduated from the University of Missouri, which also happens to be his parents’ alma mater. Roy says that even though he went to work at The Flesh Company, it was never assumed that he would do so.
“It was never a pressure situation,” Roy says. “It was never understood that I was going to come into the company, but anyone who’s honest with themselves has to admit if you see your name on a company, that’s definitely very inspiring. My father was very astute in outlining to me the opportunities The Flesh Company could bring, and he was willing to give me the reigns when the time came.”
Roy considers it fortunate that he was able to join the business while his grandfather, R.V., was still alive. “My grandfather lived until 1982,” he says. “I was in the business for 12 years before he passed on. I had the opportunity to watch a true entrepreneur in action and to watch my father grow this company after my grandfather’s death.”
Roy has also had a chance to witness the evolution of an industry. “I think I have seen more changes or challenges in the past 10 years than I’ve seen in the past 37,” Roy admits. When his father took over the business, continuous forms were just beginning to show potential. “Since I’ve been at The Flesh Company, I’ve seen the entire lifecycle of those continuous forms,” he says. “They continue to be challenged by the laser print and digital market.”
And what a digital market it has become. “The digital arena for the printing industry is truly growing,” Roy says. “The Flesh Company has made significant investments in that arena.”
In addition to seeing The Flesh Company and the industry evolve, Roy has also witnessed the evolution of DMIA. “I was involved with DMIA before I was even with The Flesh Company,” Roy says. “The Flesh Company was one of the charter members of DMIA. We have had representation in DMIA for the past 61 years.”
He says he can remember attending DMIA summits when he was a teenager. After he entered the business, he became active in DMIA (which then was NBFA, the National Business Forms Association). He served on the association’s board of directors, chaired the committee that oversaw preparation for DMIA’s 50th anniversary, and was manufacturing president of DMIA in 1996.
Roy has some predictions about DMIA and the industry in general. “Just as The Flesh Company has faced many challenges and the evolution of this industry, I’m optimistic about DMIA’s survival and that it will do the same,” he says. “I see some companies in our industry withdrawing from the new technology,” he says. “But if they refuse to invest in technology, there will be some fall out and you’ll start to see some people disappear.”
Roy has grand hopes for The Flesh Company. “One of the milestones that I’m looking forward to is the Flesh Company’s 100 year anniversary in 2013 and I’m looking even past that,” he says. “I am excited about the future even though I’m approaching my 40th anniversary at Flesh. I’m excited about the new opportunities in the digital arena.”
And will that future of the company include a fourth generation of the Flesh family? Roy isn’t sure. Right now his eldest daughter, Meghan, is focused on her horse farm, where she trains hunters and jumpers. She also is preparing to deliver Roy’s first grandchild in August with her husband, Scott. Roy’s youngest daughter, Jillian, is knee-deep in studies at the University of Missouri, where she is a senior. “Neither of my daughters at this particular time is involved in the business, but from our perspective, ‘Never say never,’” he says. “And now we have a fifth generation on the way that could continue the family legacy.”