Heidelberg gets it! Most companies talk about digital marketing, but how many do something about it that actually leverages their brand and domain knowledge? Before the Covid-19 pandemic, Heidelberg was still in the middle, or should I says in the mature phase of its restructuring, which is essentially based on the decline of commercial offset printing in the past 15 years and the shift to digital in that segment – although packaging continues to grow for sheetfed multicolor offset presses.
At the same time, Heidelberg’s human resource costs in Europe were (and probably still are) too high. So its current chief executive officer, Rainer Hundsdorfer, has continued to downsize and simplify the company. By divesting various ventures such as the B1 digital press and divisions (such as Gallus, which has come back since the potential investor didn’t pay up), and even real estate in its home city and home plant, he brought the company back to the edge of viability. Moreover, the company has openly come out with plans for manufacturing expansion jointly in a new plant on the campus of its anchor investor, Masterwork in China – its biggest market.
This year it has taken on digital marketing in a big way, with the third of its global virtual marketing events from 13 to 15 October 2021. It is creating a simultaneous global event. While it is not as interactive as some would prefer, the Heidelberg events are backed by human interventions with experts by appointment, not really unlike a real fair.
But this is a fair of one company that has a lot of variety in terms of hardware, software, and knowledge. It could take a person a couple of years to learn everything they are trying to communicate to various needs and application segments. So if you have good people in your company, get as many that are ambitious to learn and understand, to register.
In these events, Heidelberg shows its new productivity and automation technologies generally based on data continuously gathered by its cloud from running presses in the field. It leverages big data and the company’s colossal domain knowledge with some valuable insights. Its productivity tools show how to use their presses in the field better. And to learn how to fully realize the profit potential of the hardware and software they already have.
I am struck by one of Heidelberg India’s local salespeople’s excitement about what the data shows about printers’ inefficiency and poor productivity. It seems there is a lot of headroom to utilize highly automated fully and modern offset presses. This salesperson was happy to help customers improve their productivity even if it meant that purchase of a new machine could be postponed.
He was sure that helping make his customer more productive and more profitable is good business – it would lead to a sale that he could feel good about maybe a year or two from now. Above all, it would make the customer more innovative (and more profitable) – one who understands the benefits that are now built into these valuable machines and is motivated for the right reasons to go for higher technology.
Hence, I encourage printers and especially packaging companies to register and look at the next event. (I know you are busy with the economic and industry recovery.) Ask questions from the experts relevant to your situation, your market, the presses you have, and how to be more profitable. Of course, we all know that they cannot help you too much unless you know how to pick their brains for experience and new ideas – but you can try. And you can yourself get some ideas of what the future machines and technology look like and what your competition will be using.
Lastly, can you afford to keep your head in the sand and not know where the industry is headed and what you are up against when you are ingeniously leveraging your current hardware by using your expertise and market strengths?
Let me know if this makes sense, even if you are not a Heidelberg customer. Also, let me know afterward if you learned anything or it was a waste of time.
