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The company, originally named Rank Phicom, was founded by The Rank Group in 1980 to provide media replication services to the home entertainment industry. The company’s offering evolved over the years to provide a highly integrated service to content owners covering all aspects of media manufacturing, packaging and distribution services.
In 1998 Rank’s film and entertainment division of companies was renamed Deluxe after the company’s US ‘color by deluxe’ feature film processing brand. The Deluxe brand has appeared at the end of feature films since the 1920s and enabled Deluxe to establish an identity separate to its parent company with greater resonance within the film industry.
The early years of the new millennium saw Deluxe invest heavily in optical disc replication. The company now has DVD replication facilities in Little Rock, Arkansas, USA and Southwater in West Sussex, UK. Deluxe also provides CD replication to the music and games industries from its plants in Blackburn, Lancashire UK, Albi, France and Milan, Italy.
Deluxe provides a full supply chain management service to its clients. Studios are striving towards shorter movie release windows with the goal of significantly reducing the time between theatrical release and home video street dates. They need to do this on a worldwide basis without sacrificing service, cost or quality. Deluxe is committed to meeting this challenge with real process solutions. Starting with design, compression and authoring of DVD’s, Deluxe is able to replicate a variety of DVD formats including DVD-5 and DVD-9. Offset and silk-screen printing is available for the body of the disc, produced to match a wide variety of packaging options. Discs are packed using automated technology and then delivered to one of the company’s distribution hubs in a number of locations across Europe and America.
The company’s music industry clients are able to benefit from manufacturing services for Audio CD, CD-Rom and CD-R which takes place in Blackburn Lancashire and in France and Italy. Andrew Lloyd Jones, general manager of Deluxe Global Media Services’ Blackburn facility comments: “We have specific strategic plans for the CD business. Our stated intention is to be the number one for quality, delivery and service. We are the largest replicator in the UK and we intend to remain in that position. We pride ourselves on our client service, on our performance in terms of delivery, and on our ability to serve a continuously changing market. 2005 will be a pivotal year for us as we position ourselves to meet the changing needs of our clients. We have the benefit of a highly experienced team delivering excellent client service, sustained performance and proactive business management. If you don’t perform then you don’t win the business, and we have been successful at winning business and retaining it.”
Deluxe’s approach to distribution is highly geared towards the specific requirements of its clients. A tailor made SAP system is used to upload orders for despatch in a number of ways. These are then disseminated to the appropriate distribution centre where each order is handled individually to meet the specific requirements of the end customer. This can include customising product at the point of despatch, enabling product to be stickered and packaged to meet the specific demands of distributors and retailers. The company has also invested heavily in automation of its distribution processes, reducing cycle times for all order types placed through its distribution centres.
Through the on-going development of its systems, Deluxe can now offer on-line access and new reporting methods. The company is also able to offer a Vendor Managed Inventory service, which captures live sales data from the retail environment and manages the placement and replenishment of key products within store.
The company ensures customer satisfaction through listening to its customers and acting on their needs. A recent example of its continuous improvement strategy is the implementation of SAP-driven daily KPI measurements that help the company monitor its effectiveness so that any necessary adjustments can be made. Andrew Lloyd Jones comments: “We apply a methodology to every customer complaint received to analyse it, fix it, and then to report back to our clients the corrective actions we have taken to ensure that whatever has caused them dissatisfaction doesn’t occur again.”
Greg Van Howe, executive vice president for Deluxe Europe, discusses the future of the company: “We will continue to develop our offering as an integrated supply chain service provider where our customers are given an opportunity to use us as a ‘one stop shop’. This will allow them to focus their time, attention and efforts on the sales and marketing of content.” Greg concludes: “The secret of the company’s success as a whole is our excellent customer base and the people inside Deluxe that service their needs. We will continue to equip our people with the proper technology, processes and facilities to reach our goal of being the premiere supply chain services provider to the home entertainment industry.”
VTR
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