rrdonnelley.com

RR Donnelley NYSE: RRD is a Fortune 500 company based in Chicago, Illinois.  RR Donnelley is the world's premier full-service provider of print and related services, including business process outsourcing. Founded more than 140 years ago, the company provides solutions in commercial printing, direct mail, financial printing, print fulfillment, forms and labels, logistics, call centers, transactional print-and-mail, print management, online services, digital photography, color services, and content and database management to customers in the publishing, healthcare, advertising, retail, technology, financial services and many other industries. The largest companies in the world and others rely on RR Donnelley's scale, scope and insight through a comprehensive range of online tools, variable printing services and market-specific solutions. For more information, visit the company's web site at http://www.rrdonnelley.com.

 Corporate headquarters are located at 111 S. Wacker Drive.

History

The company, originally known as R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company, was founded in 1864 by Richard Robert Donnelley, a brother of Reuben H. Donnelley.

Donnelley's cartographic production facility was for many years one of the largest in the United States. In the late 1980s, the division was spun off as its own company, Geosystems, which in turn became MapQuest. It is now a subsidiary of Time Warner.

Business acquisitions and mergers

Throughout its history, particularly in the 1990s and 2000s, RR Donnelley purchased a number of other companies outright, steadily increasing in size. In February 2004, RR Donnelley merged with Moore Wallace Inc., keeping the name RR Donnelley as the name of the combined companies. Donnelley went on to purchase Indian outsource company OfficeTiger, which was rebranded with the primary company name in 2007, as well as printing company Banta Corporation in 2006. In January 2007, RR Donnelley also acquired book and educational materials printer Von Hoffmann (and creative/ pre-press subsidiary Anthology, Inc.) from Visant Corporation. An additional purchase at the beginning of 2007 was Perry Judd's Holdings Inc., a private catalog and magazine printer. At the beginning of 2008, RRD also announced the acquisition of Pro Line Printing, Inc. As of 2007, RR Donnelley is the world's largest commercial printer.

In 2007, RR Donnelley was also named as an interested party in an attempt to purchase Quebecor World.

In July 2008, the company established a multi-year contract with F+W Publications Inc., which will allow Donnelley to print a large amount of F + W's book and magazine publications. The contract is valued at about $80 million.

 

RR Donnelley Milestones

Year	Milestones
1836	Richard Robert Donnelley (R. R.), the son of John and Jane Donnelley, is born in Hamilton, Ontario, on November 15.
1849	R. R. is apprenticed to a Hamilton printer named McIntosh, and becomes the foreman of the shop at age 18.
1857	R. R. moves to New Orleans to become the printing foreman for the True Delta newspaper.
1861	Civil War breaks out in the United States. R.R. returns to Canada, stopping in Chicago on the way.
1864	In October, R. R. Donnelley arrives in Chicago, a city with 160,000 residents, mostly unpaved streets and unprecedented opportunity. He joins the Chicago publishing and printing partnership of Leroy Church and Edward Goodman. With Richard Robert’s reputation as a quality printer, the company quickly becomes one of the major book and periodical printing and publishing houses in the west, producing some 23 weekly, monthly, and quarterly publications, as well as a variety of books.
1870	Church, Goodman and Donnelley is renamed the Lakeside Publishing and Printing Company. Construction begins on the Lakeside Building, a gothic-style six-story building at the corner of Clark and Adams streets in downtown Chicago.
1871	The Great Chicago Fire destroys the newly constructed Lakeside Building and Richard Robert loses everything in the fire, including equipment and the family home in Lincoln Park.  His determination to succeed remains strong. A father of three boys (a daughter was born in 1873), he travels to New York (with a borrowed coat and free train fare) to obtain equipment on credit. His reputation for integrity precedes him and he acquires the necessary equipment to resume operations.
1873	A new Lakeside Building is completed in June on the same site as the one destroyed in the fire, just as a national depression begins.
1877	The Lakeside Publishing and Printing Company succumbs to the depression, causing R. R. to re-establish himself with two new partners, doing business as Donnelley, Gassette & Loyd.
1879	R. R. buys his partners' interest and is elected president. The company warns that counterfeits of its popular Lakeside Library literary magazine have small, unreadable type that would surely "dim or destroy the strongest eyesight."
1880	The company begins diversifying outside commercial printing and forms a subsidiary, the Chicago Directory Company, to publish the Chicago telephone directory.
1882	The company is re-named R. R. Donnelley & Sons Company. Today, we represent our brand as RR Donnelley.
1886	Richard Robert Donnelley forms the Chicago Directory Company. His elder son, Reuben, would become president of the directory company in 1887. In 1916, the directory business, now named R. H. Donnelley, separated from RR Donnelley.  R. H. Donnelley continues to be a leading publisher.
1895	The company purchases its first patent binder and begins to produce catalogs for Montgomery Ward. The company will continue to meet the evolving needs of multi-channel merchants into the age of the Internet.
1897	Artist Joseph Leyendecker is commissioned to design a decorative device for the exterior of the new Lakeside Press building at Plymouth Court and Polk Street in Chicago. The distinctive mark, which features a native American and Chicago's Ft. Dearborn, was later adopted as the company’s pressmark.
1899	Richard Robert Donnelley dies, leaving behind a legacy of integrity and a tradition of service that still guides the company today. His younger son, Thomas Elliott (T. E.) assumes the presidency of the company.
1903	The first volume of the Lakeside Classics, Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, launches the tradition of publishing a single volume each year.
1910	The company begins producing the Encyclopædia Britannica.
1918	RR Donnelley prints 250,000 covers and 1 million copies of one section of Sears, Roebuck & Company’s general catalog.
1921	The company begins its geographic expansion by building a plant in Crawfordsville, Indiana.
1929	The company begins to serve mass-circulation publishers by printing 200,000 copies of TIME magazine. The four-color cover features Japan's Emperor Hirohito, who was considered so holy that many of his own subjects had never seen his image before the magazine was printed.
1929	After several phases over a 17-year period, RR Donnelley's plant at Calumet Avenue and 22nd Street in Chicago is completed.
1930	The company publishes the Four American Books: "Two Years Before the Mast" by Richard Dana, illustrated by Edward A. Wilson, "Moby Dick" by Herman Melville, illustrated by Rockwell Kent, "Tales" by Edgar Allen Poe, illustrated by W. A. Dwiggins, and "Walden" by Henry David Thoreau, illustrated by Rudolph Ruzicka, as a way of demonstrating the quality that could be achieved using high-speed rotary presses. Copies of these editions, as well as a wide variety of books, magazines, catalogs, directories, and other important materials representative of the company’s printing history are all displayed at the Corporate headquarters in Chicago, IL.
1933	The Century of Progress World's Fair opens in Chicago and RR Donnelley is the fair's official printer.
1936	The development of heat-set ink made high-speed printing possible, and RR Donnelley printed LIFE magazine's first sellout issue of 446,000 copies.
1940	RR Donnelley celebrates its relationship with Sears by printing its Golden Jubilee catalog.
1941	Teletype setters are introduced and the company transmits TIME magazine copy on punched tapes from Chicago to New York.  Today, the company continues to embrace state of the art pre-press and premedia technologies.
1942	With the United States entering World War II, RR Donnelley, like most other businesses, suffers shortages of labor and supplies. However, the company still manages to produce TIME and LIFE magazines, as well as wartime posters, military training materials, and other work for the war effort.
1947	The South Plant in Chicago is built to meet the printing, binding, and shipping requirements of LIFE magazine.
1952	General Charles C. Haffner, Jr. succeeds T. E. Donnelley as Chairman of the Board.
1956	The company becomes publicly traded with its first offering of stock. A startup team opens a new manufacturing plant in Willard, Ohio. The facility will grow to encompass 1.3 million square feet under roof.
1959	RR Donnelley builds its Warsaw, Indiana, facility. It is the company's first gravure plant outside of Chicago.
1959	RR Donnelley buys the Rudisill Printing Company in Pennsylvania. Rudisill was renamed Donnelley Printing Company and currently serves catalog, magazine, directory and financial printing customers from Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
1961	A new corporate headquarters building, adjacent to Chicago's Calumet Plant, is completed.
1964	RR Donnelley stock begins trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol DNY.  Today, the company's NYSE symbol is RRD.
1964	Gaylord Donnelley, the founder's grandson, is elected Chairman of the Board.
1964	RR Donnelley builds a second plant in Warsaw, Indiana, to print catalogs for customers such as JCPenney.
1968	RR Donnelley builds the Mattoon, Illinois, plant that serves magazine, catalog, retail and direct mail printing customers.
1970- 1974	RR Donnelley continues to expand its platform, building plants in Mattoon, Illinois; Dwight, Illinois; Glasgow, Kentucky; and Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
1974	RR Donnelley opens a Financial Printing sales office in the heart of New York's financial district.
1975	RR Donnelley builds a facility in Elgin, Illinois to serve premedia, catalog, retail and direct mail customers.
1975	Gaylord Donnelley retires, and Charles W. Lake, Jr. becomes the first person from outside the Donnelley family to serve as chairman of the board.
1976	RR Donnelley builds the Gallatin, Tennessee, facility to serve magazine and direct mail customers.
1977	RR Donnelley's Crawfordsville, Indiana, short-run book module site is built.
1978	RR Donnelley marks the 50th anniversary of its contractual relationship with Sears, Roebuck & Company, its Mattoon, Illinois; plant delivers its billionth copy of Family Circle magazine, illustrating its reputation for long-standing customer relationships.
1978	Ben Johnson & Co. of York, England was acquired, marking RR Donnelley first expansion outside the United States. Ben Johnson currently operates as RR Donnelley Ltd. in Thorp Arch Flaxby Moor, England.
1980	RR Donnelley's Los Angeles, California site was acquired to extend the company's magazine printing presence to the west coast of the United States.
1980	RR Donnelley builds its Harrisonburg, Virginia (serves book customers), Lancaster East, Pennsylvania (serves magazine, catalog, direct mail and premedia customers) and Spartanburg, South Carolina (serves magazine, catalog and retail insert customers) sites.
1982	RR Donnelley revenues cross the billion-dollar threshold.
1983	RR Donnelley's satellite network is placed to transmit data between the United Kingdom and the United States.
1983	John B. Schwemm becomes Chairman and President; Charles W. Lake, Jr. retires as Chairman of the Board.
1983	RR Donnelley creates a Financial Services Group to enhance its offerings. The company continues to serve a broad range of capital markets and investment funds, compliance, and legal printing requirements. New financial printing facilities linked by satellite open in London, England; Ft. Worth, Texas; Denver, Colorado; Atlanta, Georgia; Chicago, Illinois and Manhattan, New York.
1984	RR Donnelley grows with a new site in Danville, Kentucky serving catalog, retail and direct mail customers.
1985	RR Donnelley capitalizes on fast growing demand for computer manuals and diskette replication. In just five years, this business grows into Documentation Services Group with a worldwide distribution network.
1986	RR Donnelley opens sites in 75 Park Place, Manhattan, New York (financial printing); and Lisle, Illinois (RR Donnelley Technology Center).
1986	The company forms an International Group as overseas operations continue to expand with Donnelley Far East Limited.
1987	RR Donnelley prints the 70th anniversary edition of World Book Encyclopedia.
1988	RR Donnelley opens its Reno, Nevada site that currently serves magazine and retail printing customers.
1989	RR Donnelley-prints Modern Maturity, which becomes the largest circulation magazine in the United States. Today, the magazine is called AARP magazine.
1989	RR Donnelley celebrates its 125th anniversary.
1991	RR Donnelley Logistics is formed to distribute printed materials for customers. Today, RR Donnelley delivers to the United States Postal Service approximately 60% of all standard mail that it handles.
1992	With the opening of a Singapore plant, RR Donnelley becomes the first company with a worldwide documentation services network serving the United States, Europe, and the Pacific Rim.
1992	R.R. Donnelley México, S.A. de C.V. is formed to acquire the assets of Laboratorio Lito Color, a catalog and promotional printer with operations in Mexico.
1994	RR Donnelley is the first American company to open a joint printing operation in China with the debut of the Shenzhen Donnelley Bright Sun Printing Company.
1996	RR Donnelley Financial acquires the Kansas City printing, mailing, and fulfillment operations of Twentieth Century Financial (TCI), the nation's 12th largest mutual fund company.
1996	RR Donnelley Polish-American Printing Company, a joint venture of RR Donnelley and the Polish-American Enterprise Fund, announces construction of a new 50,000-square-foot directory printing plant in Krakow, Poland.
1997	RR Donnelley acquires the assets of Photographic Arts, a photography studio in Elgin, Illinois, that can accommodate both conventional film and digital photography workflows.
1997	RR Donnelley opens it Roanoke, Virginia, plant, a revolutionary digital facility that offers short-run publishers the fastest, most profitable way to bring four-color books to the market.
1997	William L. Davis is named Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.
1998	RR Donnelley’s Senatobia, Mississippi magazine plant becomes the first printing plant in the U.S. to be awarded STAR status by the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) in its Voluntary Protection Program.
1998	RR Donnelley acquires Ediciones Eclipse, a catalog and newspaper insert plant in Mexico City, Mexico.
1999	Directory production begins in the company's new state-of-the art plant in Flaxby Moor, England, the world's only directory printing plant to use line-of-sight manufacturing.
2001	Fortune magazine recognizes RR Donnelley as the most admired printing company in America, according to its annual survey of business leaders.
2001	RR Donnelley creates the RR Donnelley Foundation, a private charitable foundation funded solely by the company that assumes responsibilities for the company's long-standing contributions program.
2001	RR Donnelley Financial open a new financial document management facility in Hong Kong, reflecting the company's continuing growth in the Asian market.
2004	RR Donnelley completes the acquisition of Moore Wallace Incorporated, a leading provider of commercial printing, labels, forms, and print management services. Mark A. Angelson becomes Chief Executive Officer of RR Donnelley.  Stephen M. Wolf becomes the Chairman of the Board of Directors.
2004	RR Donnelley acquires Asia Printers Ltd, a book printer for North America, Europe, and Asia under the South China Printing brand, and a financial printer in Hong Kong under the Roman Financial Press brand.
2005	RR Donnelley acquires 90% of Poligrafia S.A, a printer of magazines, catalogs, retail inserts and books in Poland.
2005	RR Donnelley acquires Spencer Press, Inc., a Wells, Maine, based printer serving the catalog, retail, and direct mail markets.
2005	RR Donnelley acquires Adplex-Rhodes' Charlestown, Indiana print operations.  The facility is a producer of tabloid-sized retail inserts.
2005	RR Donnelley acquires The Astron Group, a leader in the business process outsourcing sector, providing transactional print and mail services, data and print management, document production and marketing support services primarily in the United Kingdom. The Astron name changes to RR Donnelley Global Document Solutions.
2005	RR Donnelley acquires OfficeTiger Holdings, Inc., a leading provider of integrated business process outsourcing services through its operations in North America, Europe, India, the Philippines and Sri Lanka.
2006	RR Donnelley is named one of Americas Best Big Companies in the Media Industry category in the January issue of Forbes magazine.
2007	RR Donnelley acquires Banta Corporation. Banta provides comprehensive printing and digital imaging solutions to leading publishers and direct marketers, including advanced digital content management and e-business services.
2007	RR Donnelley acquires Perry Judd’s Holdings, Inc., a privately owned printer of magazines and catalogs.
2007	Mark A. Angelson retires from RR Donnelley and Thomas J. Quinlan III becomes the President and Chief Executive Officer of the company.
2007	RR Donnelley completes the purchase of Von Hoffmann, a printer of books and other products that serve primarily the education, trade, and business-to-business catalog customers.
2007	RR Donnelley unifies all legacy brand names under a single company brand - RR Donnelley - to provide end-to-end print, print-related and business process outsourcing services to its customers.
2007	RR Donnelley completes the purchase of Cardinal Brands, Inc., a privately-owned designer, developer and manufacturer of document related business, consumer and hobby products.
2008	RR Donnelley completes its purchase of Pro Line Printing, Inc., a multi-facility, privately held producer of retail inserts.