Brown Printing Makes Top Management Change

HAMBURG, GERMANY—March 12, 2007—The Executive Board of Gruner + Jahr today announced the following management change at Brown Printing Co. effective July 1, 2007. Volker Petersen, currently VP of strategy and chief integration officer, Prinovis, a Bertelsmann joint venture, will be appointed president and CEO of Brown Printing Co., Waseca, MN.Tom Engdahl, currently president and CEO of Brown, will step down to devote his full attention to a smooth business transition, until his planned retirement on January 1, 2008.“We appreciate the strong leadership Tom Engdahl has provided to the Brown business,” said Bernd Kundrun, G+J President and CEO. “Volker Petersen’s appointment to lead Brown now is a long planned succession to ensure continued success at the high level Brown has consistently achieved over its 28 years as a division of G+J and its 50 years overall.”“I couldn’t be more excited about my return to Brown,” says Volker Petersen. “I enjoy working closely with Tom, his staff, and others at Brown in my current role and, returning to Brown in my new role, I appreciate the advantage of the close working relationships I bring with me, both those formed in recent years and those formed during the many years I worked for Brown earlier in my career.”“This succession is a strong vote of confidence by G+J that Brown will continue to have attractive strategic value and sustain strong business results in a very difficult market,” adds Tom Engdahl. “The men and women of Brown Printing Company deliver for our customers, and our parent company supports our investment strategy to employ the latest technologies and capabilities. Now they display their support once again assigning Volker to lead Brown, a top G+J talent.”Volker Petersen earned a Mechanical Engineering degree at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences in 1984, and then from 1985 to 1988, attended Iowa State University, earning an MS degree and a PhD in Industrial Engineering. He joined the Printing Division of G+J in 1988 and, in his first assignment, participated in the startup of pre-press facilities in Franklin, KY, and in Riverside, CA. In 1996, after seven years in the United States with Brown, and the last two as production manager for two pre-press facilities, Volker transferred back to Hamburg to assume responsibility as the manager of controlling for the G+J Printing Division. One year later, he returned to Brown Printing as the VP/GM of the new Woodstock Division, formed from the 1997 acquisition of Graftek Press. After leading the successful integration of this acquisition, in 2002, he returned to Hamburg as managing director of the G+J Printing Division, with leadership responsibility for all G+J printing operations, including Brown Printing. In 2005, he assumed his current responsibilities as the rotogravure printing operations in Germany of Bertelsmann’s arvato, G+J, and Axel Springer merged to form Prinovis. Volker, his wife, Kim, and their two daughters, Nicole (14) and Krista (11), will be relocating from Hamburg to Minnesota this summer.Brown Printing Company is a nationally recognized, high quality, high volume printer serving America’s premier magazine publishers and catalogers. Brown is the 4th largest printer of consumer, trade, and business publications in the country. Founded in 1957, Brown is a long-term industry leader printing more than 700 magazines and catalogs with annual sales over $400 million and 2600 employees. A Bertelsmann/Gruner + Jahr AG company, Brown operates three state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities located across the United States.From the editors of Printing Impressions (http://www.PIWorld.com).

Publishing News

Brown Printing Makes Top Management Change

Publishing Executive Staff

About

Subscriptions

Events

Publications

WORK SMARTER - LEARN, GROW AND BE INSPIRED.

Subscribe today!

Publishing Executive Staff