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PRESS RELEASE from Fujifilm UK - Photofinishing Division
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Release Date: 25 September 2009
Image Downloads: www.newsfeeduk.com/fujifilm
D.S. Colour Labs recipe for success
Jonathan Porter has grown D.S. Colour Labs Ltd in Manchester from small beginnings into a business that images 250,000 square meters of Fujicolor Crystal Archive paper a year
D.S. Colour Labs is a third-generation family business, having being established for 58 years. Owner-manager Jonathan Porter’s grandfather originally founded the business as a wedding and portrait studio. His son, Jonathan’s father, subsequently took over the running of the wedding and portrait studio, and gradually made a film processing business out of it. When Jonathan himself took over, he at first continued the process-and-print business very much as it had been. Then he made a change, and took it online in a big way. He increased the number of minilabs in the business, adding FIVE Fujifilm Frontier 570s to his existing Frontier 350. And that’s when his Fujicolor Crystal Archive paper consumption started to rocket. It now hovers around 250,000 square metres a year. We asked Jonathan about his success, and his ingredients for it.
Leadership
The first ingredient of Jonathan Porter’s success is himself. He believes the business has to be driven by an individual personality.
He says: “It starts with you. You have to live and breathe this business. If you don’t, then when things get tough, you’re going to fail.”
Continuous drive
What Jonathan does is he continually looks for ways to drive the business forward, constantly scanning the horizon for future developments.
He says: “You’ve got to keep pushing, all the time. You have to explore every single avenue. You can’t take your eye off the future.”
Listen to the right people
Jonathan taps into the business insight and market knowledge of Fujifilm, always inquiring what the next opportunity will be. He says: “I work closely with Fujifilm to see where things are going. Without Fujifilm we have no business. The company has some very knowledgeable people. They tend to be at the forefront of everything.”
Bet on the most likely horses
Jonathan says: “Years ago I talked to some of the people at Fujifilm who were saying online was the future, and I took that on-board. I worked closely with Fujifilm’s software team, to get an online solution into my lab. And now just a few years later I can class myself as a mini PhotoBox.”
He continues: “When I was picking a target market I focused on the professionals. When we were going online I tapped into the professional photography market, advertised in a lot of the pro magazines. That focus did help.”
Run things fast, reliably
Jonathan attributes the success of his lab to the quality and speed of its turnaround, and the efficiency of its whole operation. At D.S. Colour Labs it is still possible for a professional photographer who submits a large job of pictures for printing at three o’clock in the afternoon to receive them the following morning.
Jonathan tells us: “I pushed things forward to make sure we got systems in the lab that would enable us to run the equipment very, very fast. That was the way to produce the quality the professionals needed at a price they could afford, while still making money ourselves.”
D.S. Colour has five Fujifilm Frontier 570 minilabs and a Frontier 350. One of the reasons Jonathan has installed so much kit is to have the capacity to provide that lightning fast service in all circumstances. Another reason is to have the redundancy and back-up to provide it 100% reliably.
He says: “I think the Fujifilm Frontier 570 is the best minilab ever made. The reliability is really, really good on the 570. They’re so well built. They’re easy to maintain. We can do much of the maintenance ourselves, and can even deal with some issues if they crop up.”
Be dynamic, Give the customer what they want
Jonathan believes in being dynamic, both in the way the business is driven, and in the way the lab is operated.
Many pro-labs offer only a limited range of standard print sizes and papers. They do this because, with the equipment they have, the most efficient way to utilise it is to set each machine up to run just one particular paper, and leave it that way.
D.S. Colour Labs is much more dynamic in the way it utilises equipment. The flexibility of its Fujifilm Frontier 570 digital minilabs enables it to swap and change paper as needed, very quickly and without waste.
D.S. Colour Labs prints all sizes from passport photos right up to 24 x 36 inch prints, and every size can be routinely ordered online.
All D.S. Colour Labs’ Frontier 570’s can print any of the sizes the firm offers, and its systems can route prints to whichever one of the minilabs is the best to put the job on when it comes in. If a job requires a different Fujifilm paper, they will load that paper.
Succeed gradually
D.S. Colour first went online in 2003. But for the first four years the business grew only gradually. Jonathan was trying out different systems and different ways of doing things. But in 2007 things really started to pick up, and by January 2008 his volumes had become strong and sustained.
The internet had increased D.S. Colour Lab’s reach. It was able to accept jobs from more distant photographers. They would never have risked putting their films in the post to Manchester, but were perfectly happy to transmit jobs digitally over the web.
D.S. Colour started using the Fujifilm SmartPix virtual kiosk as its on-line customer interface from 2008.
Jonathan says: “It’s easy to use. We did a lot of tweaking with Pete Jackson from Fujifilm, to make the workflow of customer ordering a lot easier for our professionals, and I think we’ve got it right now.”
He continues: “We’ve always been a big fan of Fujifilm. Generally, whatever Fujifilm put their name to is good.”
Conclusion
As a case-study, Jonathan Porter’s success with D.S. Colour Labs illustrates Fujifilm’s ability to believe in and support outstanding entrepreneurial individuals, not just by supplying them with excellent equipment and products, but by partnering with them and enabling them to tap into the corporation’s knowledge, expertise and business intelligence, without compromising the entrepreneur’s unique vision and style, or getting in the way of their extraordinary success.
To ask about Fujifilm Frontier minilabs and Fujicolor Crystal Archive paper, or to find out how you can tap into the business knowledge of Fujifilm, e-mail minilabs@fuji.co.uk or call the minilab sales team, on 1234 217 724.
ENDS.
* Note: this news release is issued electronically and will not be duplicated with a posted copy
About Fujifilm
Fujifilm is a global leader in imaging technology, products and services including digital cameras, photofinishing, digital storage and recording media, consumer and professional film, motion picture film, professional video, printing systems, medical imaging, office technology, flat panel displays and graphic arts. The company employs more than 73,000 people worldwide, with 178 subsidiaries stretching across four continents.
Uniquely placed to be a market leader in digital imaging, Fujifilm develops and manufactures its own sensors, lenses and processing technology. In addition to its production plants and R&D operations in Japan, the company has key manufacturing facilities in Europe and the USA for core products such as colour film, colour paper, single use cameras and CTP printing plates, and has further factories in Brazil and China. It has a global turnover in excess of £13 billion.
In the UK, Fujifilm has been supplying the imaging, printing and graphics industries, as well as consumers, professional and enthusiast photographers, with high quality, innovative products and services for over 25 years. Fujifilm UK currently employs more than 450 people and has become one of the country's most popular photographic and imaging brands.
© 2009, Fujifilm UK Ltd. Specifications are subject to change.
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Fujifilm (UK) Ltd
Unit 10A
St Martins Business Centre
St Martins Way
Bedfordshire MK42 0LF
Tel: 01234 572144
E-mail: minilabs@fuji.co.uk
Web: www.fujifilm.co.uk/minilabs
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Written and distributed by WPS Media
Tel. 01323 749400
Contact: Peter Brandon
Email: peter@wpsmedia.co.uk