Advance Local is a subsidiary of Advance Publications and is one of the largest media companies in the USA. It has eleven local news websites and more than 22 core newspaper publications, with an audience of over 50 million monthly unique visits online. Advance Local also offers a wide variety of printing services, publishing a total of over 180 publications, including their core products and those of other commercial print clients.
The Need
Because of continued, significant decline in print, Advance Local has been investing in cost-saving prepress and production strategies over the past few years. However, all printing locations and markets were still operating independently using local hardware, different systems and workflows, resulting in higher maintenance and labor cost.
The Solution
Advance Local decided to centralize and optimize the workflows by introducing enterprise-wide standards for all its locations.
The installation of ppi Media’s Digital Assembly Line started in 2018. The eight Advance Local print sites are now managed by a cloud (AWS) based centralized EPWS (Enterprise Publishing Workflow System). There are also four 3rd party print sites that are set up to receive completed ppi-created pages. The process includes edition planning, imposition schemes, preflight validation, ink presets and optimization, and proofing solutions in combination with a highly automated state of the art output management system across the enterprise.
The system is designed to manage commercial products as well as newspaper production and to support local workflow requirements.
The system is deployed across two AWS regions, providing for high availability of services and disaster preparedness.
Benefits
ppi Media’s Enterprise Publishing Workflow System enables publishers:
- to manage more volume with smaller, cross-trained teams, enterprise-wide.
- to remove local hardware and software systems.
- to reduce maintenance and support contract costs.
- to create a first-needed, first-out workflow for all 12 print sites.
- have its system configuration and support carried out by a single tech team, as well as end-to-end workflow specialists, improving service levels, communication, and cutting down on operating costs.
“For us, the ppi Media system delivered a complete end-to-end workflow that has met our needs by allowing us to consolidate our workflows, improve our business continuity, and increase our overall efficiency and productivity.” – Advance Local Prepress and Technology Leadership.