Press Releases
PlanSystem3™ Allows Hachette Filipacchi Media to Improve Quality of Leading Magazines
Amsterdam, October 31st, 2006 – Leading Dutch publishing house, Hachette
Filipacchi Media (formerly Quote Media), is enjoying the time and money saving
benefits provided by Van Gennep’s publication process management system
PlanSystem3™ (version 3.6.5), installed in the first part of 2006 to
improve workflow and streamline production of its magazines, including the
Dutch ‘Elle’ range. The extra time, created by eliminating the
need for daily meetings and time-consuming manual planning, is now being used
to perfect quality of features and images.
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Pieter Veenema, production manager, Hachette Filipacchi Media, comments, ‘Implementation
of PlanSystem3 was about more than pushing extra magazine copies. The solution
has given us additional time to spend being creative, writing better articles
and improving our magazines’ visual quality. Staff morale has also improved
due to less stress and better creative opportunities, and we believe that
the readers take home a more attractive product - increasing the success
of our magazines.’
Veenema explains that before installation of PlanSystem3, approximately
200 hours per year were spent discussing problems and manually writing plans
on paper for each published magazine. Constant status updates were needed,
and making changes meant totally re-writing plans, with additional meetings
and lengthy phone calls.
The company now starts production of each issue by using PlanSystem3’s
edition plan builder, PlanMaker, to formulate the magazine’s edition
plan. PlanJob, the individual workflow module, is then applied to create
personal work lists.
PlanControl, the senior management production monitoring and control module,
is used by Hachette Filipacchi Media’s senior staff to manage the publication’s
overall production and design process, while PlanAction, a module enabling
any manual task within the system to be automated via scripting capabilities,
facilitates easy interaction between all activities throughout the production
process.
During magazine creation, PlanSystem3’s PlanView module is used by everyone
involved in production (including printers), to view a magazine’s status,
visualizing the complete publication as it is being produced - including
any creative mistakes made during the production process - ensuring that the
final
printed product is exactly as intended.
Integrating with WAVE’s Mediabank™ Digital Asset Management solution
and Adobe®’s InDesign® and InCopy®, PlanSystem3 enables
control over the complete publication production process.
Veenema continues, ‘After formulating the initial plan using the PlanMaker
module, the rest of the production process runs like clockwork. Having streamlined
this process, we now have more time to concentrate on improving other areas
of production.’ The freed-up labour time provided has also enabled Hachette
Filipacchi Media to bring prepress in-house, providing further opportunities
for increased quality control and time and money savings.
Veenema concludes, ‘As a business we don’t have the time to learn
complicated technology – creativity is our priority. So, we needed a
system that would fit perfectly in this profile. Having looked at the systems
on the market, we found PlanSystem3 to be perfect, since it appealed to us
from the beginning, due to its easy user interface and support, not disturbance,
of the creative process. Since installation we have been extremely impressed
by Van Gennep’s high quality customer service, and the benefits of PlanSystem3.
We are very pleased. ’
About Van Gennep – M.A.C. bv
Based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Van Gennep has been providing media
workflow solutions to magazine, catalog and textbook publishers as well as
retailers, media agencies and design studios for over 17 years. PlanSystem3™ version
3.6.5 is Van Gennep’s latest planning, creative process and editorial
workflow management system aiding time and cost savings across media production.
To date, Van Gennep’s systems are used on more than 170 publishing sites
worldwide.
Van Gennep’s extensive experience of the publishing industry has led
to the development of its acclaimed visual edition-planning tool, PlanMaker™,
which is not only used to design complete publication plans, but also displays
in real time the status of every element on each page in the production process.
PlanMaker fE, a modified version of PlanMaker, will be sold via a reseller
channel as a stand-alone product with connectivity to Smart Connection Enterprise,
while the PlanMaker product itself is sold as a module with additional features
as part of Van Gennep’s third-generation planning, process and workflow
management system, PlanSystem3.
By introducing its new Dolce Vita Media Solutions as off the shelf products,
Van Gennep enables smaller companies and creatives to use its large scale
products - based on its long time publishing experience - at a smaller scale
also.
CONTACT:
Nanette Schoute
+31-20-6976029
Van Gennep – M.A.C. BV
Burg. Stramanweg 105
Amsterdam
The Netherlands
press@vangennep.com