The Path to Product Excellence: Avoiding Common Pitfalls and Enhancing Commun...
BNI Two Valleys
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Editor's Notes
ASAP was born in 2004 as a promotional items company, but then its evolved into more of a print company. 40% of our business printing servicing SME’s and some larger organisations. However the same proportion of business comes from our shop where students come to us for branded leisurewear. Promotional items is only 15% of our business now. What do we have planned for the future? Well the imminent future will see us taking on staff to manage the shop in Loughborough and then hopefully taking on a full time sales person. Long term: We also want to replicate our Loughborough shop model and perhaps branch out into other unis, perhaps even franchise it.
Three main people hold the fort at ASAP. I’m based in Derby and look after the digital and litho printing. We’re a member of two BNI chapters, this one and one in Leicester. Martin is looking after the Loughborough shop and is the promotional items expert. Julie is based in Leicester and looks after the money.
Why did someone like me get into printing? Simples, its in my blood. My dad was a printer. And It all began with this very book, a Pantone book which is industry known for the different coloured special ink that we use to print corporate literature like stationery. Sad thing is, I’m using my pantone books less and less because its often just as cost effective to print full colour.
What do we do? To avoid reeling off hundreds of items, if you visit my website www.ilovepromo.co.uk and scroll to the bottom, there’s a list of most things we do. But there are more. I need to put on there. Just want to cover the two types of printing we do: Litho printing - suited for longer runs 2500+ physically large items like A4, for instance we printed Mark’s flyers this way - they’re A4 and he had 5000. Digital printing is great for when you need something quickly or not very many of them. Saying that though if someone wanted 2500 A6 flyers, digital will still be the way forward. We would also use digital printing when something needs personlised like invitations. And that’s where our 36 years combined experience comes into play. Knowing what method of printing will suit the project and what’s going to save the client money. And just to demonstrate the variety of items we can produce I’ve put together this case study.
Also want to talk to Schools and colleges who’d like to produce merchandise to generate revenue and I’d like introductions into companies you know who still have their newsletters printed. I want to talk to them about personalising them in order to get a better response rate.
This client is a perfect example of a perfect referral. I got this client thanks to a referral from Wendy Andrew. Client is called the “Enlighten Programme”, Its an alternative way to dieting. Based in Ashbourne. Small business.
First enquiry was for workbooks. I went over to see her and had a chat about what she’s looking to do. After the meeting she told me that she had had a meeting with another print company about the same items but all they did was take the details and give her a price. She said that I was different because I gave lots of advice and ideas; ideas that could potentially save her money. She said “you certainly know your stuff” Their first order was for just one workbook. I thought oh crickey this is going to be a loss lead here. HOW WRONG WAS I? Because it lead to 4 repeat order of 20-50 workbooks, wallcharts,……..
Here are our lovely clients as you can see there, the likes of Oberoi Consulting AKA the secret millionnaire. They call me on an almost daily basis wanting something producing. I’d like another client like that. Shires motorcycles trainings, based on West Meadows ind estate and you’ve probably seen them riding about. Them and Express Sales, right track, holiday show have been clients of mine for years and years. For them keeping coming back to me for all this timeI think that speaks volumnes to the quality service I personally provide my clients. Other prestigious names like Lufbra Uni, Quad, British Triathlon. What do we do for them? Well Quad, we produce flyers, name badges, mugs etc. British Triathlon, leaflets, business cards etc. There’s also Linford Christies’ charity on there, Street Athletics. We produce a number of flyers and stickers for them and every year we’ve produced their annual newsletter.
