VESTCOM INTERNATIONAL — SETTING RETAIL STANDARDS

August 2006 BY CHRIS BAUER
Managing Editor

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FROM THE beginning, Steve Bardwell knew his company’s success depended on its ability to continually innovate. That success has been realized with the help of digital printing technology and by becoming a leader in a niche market.

Founded in Little Rock, AR, in 1985 as Electronic Imaging Services, the company now known as Vestcom International specializes in digital printing for the nation’s leading retailers.

“Today, Vestcom serves more than 60 percent of the nation’s grocery, drug and mass merchandise retailers from its 10 production facilities located throughout the United States,” explains Bardwell, Vestcom president and CEO.

Vestcom is a leading provider of data-driven, shelf-edge communications for retailers. The company’s client list includes eight of the nation’s top 10 supermarket chains, eight of the top 10 grocery wholesalers, four of the top five drug store chains, as well as the second largest mass merchandiser in the country.

“As a leading provider of communications for retailers, Vestcom helps its retail customers communicate their message at the shelf edge,” contends Tim McKenzie, executive vice president of sales and marketing. “With more than 65 percent market share in the U.S., Vestcom has partnered with the giants in the retail industry.”

Unlike other in-store communications companies, Vestcom does not provide cookie-cutter “products,” McKenzie says. Rather it creates solutions to a particular retailer’s in-store communications challenges, including center store revitalization, and time/labor savings opportunities.

To help keep the company on the leading edge of technology, it recently purchased five Xeikon 5000 digital color presses in combination with the X-800 digital front end. The webfed machines were installed at Vestcom’s Little Rock facility, which specializes in data-intensive, point-of-purchase solutions.

According to Steve Ulmschneider, Vestcom’s senior vice president of operations, the decision to purchase the Xeikon 5000 web presses was based on their high-volume digital printing capabilities.

Turning Up the Volume

“It can easily handle monthly volumes of up to 3 million letter-size pages,” Ulmschneider asserts. He adds that Vestcom is expanding its cut-sheet color printing capability in 2006 with the installation of a Xerox iGen3 digital press. Vestcom will further expand capabilities across the entire network in 2007, he reveals.

A team of more than 500 Vestcom professionals, plus 350,000 square feet of production and stock inventory space, ensure the same or next day service for scheduled production of high-volume, multiple-store retail communications. Vestcom regularly creates in-store projects for its retail clients according to local, regional or competitive demands.

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