Partnership Profile
Courier and Willow Creek Association
The Willow Creek Association (WCA) depends on Courier to inventory and fulfill their educational materials, as well as manufacture them. The relationship began in 1999 when WCA was expanding their publishing program and needed a partner that could handle their substantial daily order volume and get product into their customers' hands fast. Soon after the fulfillment relationship was established, WCA began to call on Courier to manufacture their books, audio tapes and other educational materials.

WCA creates books, bible studies, audio tapes and curricula and makes these resources available to its member churches. Until the partnership with Courier, they co-published their materials with another large Christian publishing house. The move to self-publishing and to Courier has given WCA more control over their business, provided them with one-stop shopping and enhanced their members' access to their product.

WCA considered doing their own fulfillment, but their desire to focus on publishing led them to choose Courier to manufacture their products, and to process and ship their daily orders. Like many companies, "Courier's standards for excellence in both fulfillment and manufacturing have been amazing! Their creative approach to meeting our ever-changing business needs, in addition to their attention to detail and 'can-do' attitude, have served our ministry immensely." -- Carolyn Irwin, Director of Manufacturing and Distribution, Willow Creek Association.

WCA chose Courier over larger fulfillment houses because Courier's size and agility allows them to provide more personal attention and to adapt procedures to the customer's changing needs.

Today the partnership is going strong. WCA's ministry is thriving, and Courier is handling their expanding needs without missing a beat.

CTP Installed at Stoughton
Courier's Stoughton, MA plant has installed a CreoScitex thermal computer-to-plate imaging system. Large- and standard-format platesetters will handle all new work for the plant beginning in mid-June.

This marks the third installation of CTP, after Westford and Kendallville. Now all of Courier's text and cover work, with the exception of short-run sheet fed, will run computer-to-plate.

Courier uses a standard front-end (Prinergy workflow) for Westford, Kendallville and Stoughton. This enables greater manufacturing flexibility due to the portability of files, and it opens the door for development of improved services, such as online proofing and online job status.

New Developments at rightfromthestart.com
If it's a while since you've been to Courier's production and prepress web site, rightfromthestart.com, you might want to check it out. The look is the same, but the navigation has been simplified and improved. We have also made room for some new features that are coming soon.

Kendallville Installs New Case Line
In March, Courier Kendallville installed a Kolbus Compact 2000 case line, which is now in full production, just in time for the busy summer season. It allows the plant to bring all its outsourced work in-house, adding greater capacity and faster turnaround. The new line has an annual capacity of more than six million books.

BookTech West 2001
BookTech West is the western region's premier book technology conference and expo, bringing together top book publishing professionals to address the industry's production, prepress, printing, and electronic media challenges. This year's event will be held July 30 - August 1, 2001, at the San Francisco Marriott. Visit Courier at Booth 402. Contact your Sales Representative for free tickets.

Courier People on the Move
In North Chelmsford, Don Hunter has been appointed to the position of Director of Sales and Marketing Operations. Don will work closely with the sales organization regarding sales, customer analyses, and marketing strategies, and in implementing IT initiatives within the sales and marketing organization. Kim Molloy, formerly Customer Service Supervisor for Westford, has moved to North Chelmsford to work with Don as the Process Improvement Specialist.

In Westford, Bob Valentine, formerly Scheduling Supervisor, is the new Customer Service Supervisor, Dennis Collins has been promoted to Scheduling Supervisor, and Dave Senter has been named Bindery Manager. Additionally, Linda Hallowell has taken the position of Estimator, and Kathy Grogan will be the Bindery Scheduler.

Victor Walter has joined National Publishing Co. as Inventory and Materials Manager, and Gale Fencer has joined Courier Stoughton as an Account Manager. Gail has a wealth of book industry experience, having held scheduling and service positions with Phoenix Color, New England Book Components and Arcata Graphics.

Right From the Start Tip
If you are creating artwork with Adobe Illustrator, be sure to use version 8.0.1 or higher. There is a bug in earlier versions of the software that causes spot color vignettes to separate into their CMYK equivalents. You can download a patch for Illustrator 8.0.1 from any of the plant specific download pages in the "TOOLS" section of www.rightfromthestart.com.