Ensuring Brand Consistency with Advanced Graphics Management

8/12/2019 RRD

See how RRD helped a manufacturer optimize its supply chain planning and enhance performance visibility through improved graphics management.

BACKGROUND

A large-scale, private label manufacturer and marketer struggled to achieve brand consistency across an extensive range of products. The brand needed a solution that was efficient, dependable, and cost-effective.

CHALLENGE

Rockline Industries is a large manufacturer and marketer of branded and private label products with its corporate headquarters in Sheboygan, WI, and manufacturing facilities in the U.S., England, and China.

Rockline is the largest supplier of coffee filters and private label wet wipes in North America. It also manufactures baking cups, household cleaning products, and a variety of contract wipe products.

The company had organized its prepress needs transactionally by having their printers provide prepress services, either in-house or outsourced. But this large variation in print workflows compromised output quality.

Because Rockline used various printers’ separators for different SKUs, brand consistency was almost nonexistent. Printers using flexo and offset technologies across differing substrates made brand management even more challenging.

In some cases the same products sitting side by side on store shelves looked markedly different.

Managing these issues made prepress communications a more time-consuming task than it should be. Thankfully, Rockline’s Creative Services and Purchasing teams found a solution by partnering with the prepress experts at RRD.

SOLUTION

With such a large number of SKUs, Rockline required brand management that could guarantee consistency across their product range, ultimately supported by an efficient workflow system with robust reporting capabilities.

First, RRD’s prepress experts moved Rockline’s graphics workflow to a centralized management model. Unlike Rockline’s previous “distribute then manage” model where graphics were isolated and later bundled into the print workflow, the new structure meant graphics would now be centralized and distributed as managed, approved, print-ready files.

Together, RRD and Rockline created a new workflow system to maintain seamless brand consistency and improve ease-of-use for all stakeholders. As a result, RRD now provides flexo plates to several of Rockline’s printers. With its new, centrally managed workflow, Rockline achieved:

A single point of communication
Reduced graphics redundancy
Centralized printer press profile management
Consistent color and branding across print methods and substrates
A simplified graphics workflow with print purchasing

To further protect brand consistency, RRD ensures Rockline’s branding and color specifications are met by working directly with Rockline’s print vendors in the planning and execution of every print project.

RESULTS

Because guaranteed cycle times are ensured by RRD, Rockline is able to optimize supply chain planning. RRD also keeps Rockline current with a monthly metrics report that tracks performance of every step of the prepress process, from cycle times to quality control.

After working together since 2006, Rockline signaled their satisfaction with the results of its partnership with RRD by extending their agreement for three consecutive terms through June 2019.