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As published in
Greetings Magazine
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One woman's mission to expand the imprinting industry
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Angie Novak-Becerra,Vice-President of Colors by Design is determined to help the imprinting industry expand.
And she thinks she has the solution: software that empowers retailers to create personalized invitations that meet the constantly increasing demands of the imprinting customer.
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"By the late 90s our industry was losing ground because we weren't offering the consumers truly great invitations", Becerra remembers. "Consumers wanted unique invitations, and they wanted them fast. When they couldn't find invitations they considered special, or when they couldn't get them soon enough, they'd turn to Kinkos or their home computers." According to Becerra, the failure to turn out great products taught consumers that they could do without store bought invitations, thereby precluding retailers from leveraging small sales into consistently larger ones. "We weren't selling our expertise as invitation specialists", she explains, "and as a consequence we were losing the opportunity to SEND invitations".
The industry's problem became hers in 1997 when Colors By Design, a pioneer in the imprintables industry, opened a personalization division. Needing software that was easy for her staff to learn but powerful enough to create invitations a cut above those produced by the average home computer, she searched for the right combination of power and ease of use. She looked at Social Secretary, Inscribe, Calligraphix, Arts & Letters, Corel, and Pagemaker. Much to her surprise she discovered that the best software was what she had been using for years - a program called Personalized Expressions.
Becerra found the program, designed especially for imprinters, easy to use but capable of creating the desired special effects. Surprisingly, Becerra's quest ended in something larger. After working with the developers of Personalized Expressions on enhancements, one thing lead to another, and in the fall of 2001 Colors By Design and Personalized Expressions entered into a joint venture.
"For us it was natural", explains Gary Raskin, president of Colors By Design. "We were providing imprintables to our customers, so it made sense to provide software which allowed our customers to make effective use of those imprintables".
But PE was not designed to favor card stock from Colors By Design. As Becerra explains, "We wanted PE to be completely open, welcoming product from any and all companies in our industry. Our goal was to expand the market for imprintables, not just the market for our imprintables". The first fruit of the CBD-Personalized Expressions collaboration was PE's Creation Station, which debuted at the 2001 National Stationery Show. Offering cards from Colors By Design, Fitzgraphics, Mara Mi, and NRN (Glad Tidings has since been added), the PE Creation Station allowed retailers to print entire invitations, including image and text.
The advantages of in-store printing are many, says Don Cooper, the owner of Personalized Expressions. "You can offer a tremendous selection at low cost, you're never out of stock, there is never any waste, and you never have a discontinued item."These advantages may be more compelling now that Creation Station has incorporated a revolutionary edge-to-edge printing system. Using this system, a retailer simply feeds blank stock into the printer, which transforms it into finished product without further processing.
"It's magical", says Raskin, "The first time people see it they shake their heads and say 'You've got to be kidding.' They are totally astounded."
Most importantly for Becerra, PE and Creation Station now provide the retailer with the perfect tool for expanding their businesses. As she explains, "PE and Creation Station are all about empowering retailers to do what is necessary to expand their business by answering the varying demands of the invitation consumer. A retailer can use Creation Station to create highly themed or seasonal invitations, and they can use PE to enhance and sell store stock."
Explaining that the Creation Station library complements the industry's products rather than displaces them, she rejects the notion that in-store printing can replace store stock. "Not only does store stock draw customers in the first place, a big part of retailing is merchandising, and you can't always do that effectively from a book or a browser." And Becerra is happier than anyone about the results. Looking over her busy printing department, she explains: "I love knowing our program helps retailers expand their business by creating wonderful invitations." Her conviction in this regard is bred from experience. "Because we use PE every day to turn out great products for our customers, I know it works and how great it really is", she relates. Then she's off, back to her mission of expanding the imprinting industry.
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