Felix Ocasio carefully works on diopter strips used in digital printing at American Printing.

The Providence Journal / Bob Thayer

As the deadline approached, Paul Carroll realized there was only one way he could deliver an important printing order that his company was preparing for CVS/Caremark. The order had to be in New York City that afternoon, and the day was already half over.

Carroll, owner of American Printing, a 20-year-old print shop in East Providence, knew that driving into Manhattan at rush hour would mean missing the deadline. So, he gathered up the 200 or so gift boxes his company had assembled for the pharmacy giant and loaded them into his airplane.

Carroll, a pilot for 20 years, flew his Beechcraft single-engine Bonanza F33A to LaGuardia Airport, in New York. In a rented car, he delivered the order to the studios of the ABC show The View, on time. CVS planned to give the boxes, which contained coupons for beauty products, to those in the studio audience during the taping of the next day’s show.

“It had to be there,” Carroll said in a telephone interview. “I couldn’t say, gee, can you give me another day?”

Carroll said that his company offers a range of printing services, from business cards and company catalogs to large display signs, such as those seen in grocery and electronics stores. He said American Printing’s specialty is filling orders that customers need immediately.

According to the Printing Industries of New England, a trade association, the industry is dominated by small and medium-sized businesses, most employing fewer than 20 people.

In 2005, there were 171 printing companies in Rhode Island, employing 4,200 people, according to the association. Total sales for products shipped from Rhode Island companies that year were $632 million.

But the printing industry is shrinking, according to government figures. The number of workers in printing jobs in the United States in 2005 was about 593,000, down about 10 percent from 660,000 in 2002.

Economic problems that followed the 9/11 terrorist attacks led many printers to lay off staff, and those employees were never replaced, according to Ron Ellis, a prepress consultant, in a column he wrote for the summer edition of Printing Perspectives Interactive Newsletter. In addition, advances in software and printing technologies have allowed customers to handle some of the print work that previously was handed over to printers, he wrote.

Another factor is the growing trend of offshoring work, Carroll said. Things such as jewelry cards that hold an item on a display rack are now printed in other countries.

Carroll, 53, has been in the printing business most of his adult life. After a brief stint teaching music at two public schools, he said he realized he hated it. He tried being a minister for the Salvation Army, and soon learned that the life of poverty was not for him.

That’s when he decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and joined his dad’s company. Harry Carroll was a print broker — a middleman who acted as a go-between for companies that had printing needs, and printers.

Eventually, Carroll said he went into business for himself, first as a broker and then as a printer, when other printers couldn’t satisfy the needs of his customers.

“It’s a very old industry,” Carroll said. “Profit margins are extremely slim, and it requires lot of capital investment to stay on top.”

Carroll said that despite the changes in the industry, his 60-employee company has been thriving. He said his sales last year were $5.5 million, up 400 percent from $1.6 million in 2002. Sales this year are expected to be $7 million.

Part of the reason for his success, he said, is his decision to embrace the latest printing technologies, an expensive but necessary strategy.

For example, he said, he is one of the few Rhode Island printers to have purchased a specialized ink-jet printer that can put photo-quality graphics on many kinds of materials, such as glass, ceramic tiles, wood, cloth and plastic. It can handle pieces as large as 4 feet by 8 feet, he said.

The cost: $250,000.

But having that piece of machinery allowed his company to fill an order for a company working for Nintendo. The game company wanted to replace signs for its new Wii game system that were on display in stores across the United States. The new signs would have an image printed on a 2-foot-by-3-foot plastic board. The job required the company to print 400 of these signs, fit them with magnets, package them with assembly instructions and ship them to various electronics stores across the country. And it all had to be done in three days.

“It was quite an orchestrated effort,” Carroll said.

Another factor in the company’s growth, he said, is its customer-centric approach. When customers call, they speak to a human, not a phone tree, he said. He also credits his employees.

“We have all the right players on the team … people who really do care.”

The company is outgrowing its current location in the Narragansett Industrial Park, Carroll said, and he is now negotiating to purchase space at a nearby building that has nearly twice the space.

As for making deliveries by plane, Carroll said that is only done as a last resort. He said he’s got other things to worry about.

“As president of a company of our size, jumping in a plane is not something I want to do.”

tbarmann@projo.com