Relentlessly Striving for Success
The packaging and label production industry wouldn’t be the same without the matriarch of Accent Tag & Label, Dixie Davis. With almost a half century of printing and label experience, Dixie embodies the industry – considered a pioneer of flexographic printing in the Midwest.
It all started in 1987, with a passion for quality and service. Dixie and her partner took out a small loan to buy their first press, a Mark-Andy 2-color web flexographic behemoth. But that was just the start of what would eventually become a facility spanning over 30,000 square feet, with over a dozen flexographic and digital web presses on the South side of Des Moines, Iowa. But we get ahead of ourselves.
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From the August 1997 issue of Success Magazine:
“…sick of the lack of control she had over service and quality as a sales manager, {Davis} started the business with just a press operator (her partner at the time) and a receptionist. Although it meant 20-hour workdays, the firm grew. By 1993 Davis had 20 employees and a $2 million revenue.”
Through economic boons and busts, natural disasters and more, Dixie Davis took a fledgling printing company from running rolled labels for small agriculture companies, private label manufacturers, and insurance companies to producing award-winning packaging and labeling for renowned food and spice companies and Fortune 100 organizations around the world.
“We don’t know the meaning of the word ‘Stop,'” said Davis, “During the floods of ’93, when we had water lapping at our doorstep, we pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps and worked even harder to get product out for our customers. Central Iowa may have been under water, but when labels needed to be in Ontario by Wednesday, they got there on the Tuesday before.”
With that insatiable drive, grit, and determination, Accent Tag & Label pushed the industry past every perceived limitation and on to a future that is brighter than anyone could have expected. With the well-known “Davis Drive, ” Accent led the charge with printing innovation and discovery, testing, evaluating and pioneering breakthroughs in the printing industry that will lead the company well into the future.
The digital printing future