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FROM OUT OF THE SHADOWS
“We’re part of that creative process... not just a supplier.”
continued from page 8
“We’ve been known as so many things over the years, but now, the LPC branding is giving us the identity we need to get us onto the facilities map.”
Operating under RTL Group, LPC may be part of a big family itself – responsible for 17,500 hours of programming in 150 countries around the world – but manages its own business and draws in its own clients.
Yet while there are advantages to being a big player in the industry, Cimelli and Creative Services Director John Cooper are keen to stress that there is a much more per- sonal nature to the way they work.
“This is an incredibly competi- tive field,” Cooper adds, “and we’re really like a number of facili- ty houses within one big organisa- tion. So all the client sees is 100% focus and care, with each client being equally important to us.
“We have client managers and we have teams of people who work under those managers who are employed specifically to deal with that one client.”
Naturally LPC provides every- thing that you would expect from
a facilities house. The company boasts more than sixty streams of playout plus 25 edit suites, four
audio suites, five digital studios, archiving, tape transfer and much more. LPC are capable of following a programme through from its origins to its transmission under the one roof.
“That has been a key selling point for us. We’ve built such a large busi- ness within such a robust and powerful infrastructure that a client will come here initially to do playout, and then on the back of that find that we can do their post production and studio work.
“They can also get office space here, access to technology, everything from the most hi-tech requirement to something as simple as a pencil.
“This is part of the new way we’re doing business, forming close relation- ships with suppliers and clients, and pulling them into one big think tank so that if the solutions are technical we’re the first to get there, and we get solutions that work.”
Maybe it is this holistic approach that makes LPC stand out. But just like their smallest competi- tor they are always looking for signs of change in a rapidly evolv- ing industry, pointers to the direc- tion of and potential demand for new technologies.
Making sure that you are able to fulfil the customer’s future require-
ments as well as keeping them happy in the present is no easy task.
“One of the things we’ve started to change over the last few months is share in the brainstorming meetings that some of our customers have,” Cimelli continues.
“They might say they’re launching this channel and these ideas, these types of programmes and we’re in there, we’re part of that creative process. We’re not just a supplier.”
“Because of close working relation- ship we enjoy with our clients, the advantage for us is that we can see what they want. This gives us an idea of where the technology needs to go.
And if the client’s not sure then we’re big and brave enough to take on some of the risk involved. That’s one of the great assets our economies of scale can bring. Our job is to consoli- date all of that, make sure we’ve got the right suppliers and make sure our technology is moving in the right direction.”
Big, blue chip companies are likely to be resistant to too much change too quickly, wary of a technological bandwagon that may be heading in the wrong direction entirely. Cimelli understands this, but identifies one significant area of change: the inevitable move to a tape- less environment.
“Portability is one of the biggest problems at the moment. But there’s also a psychological factor; I think clients like to hold a programme in their hands. They like to see a tape, they also like to know that if they want another language or if they want to re-version it they can take a programme in their hands to the edit suite and have it re-worked.”
Meeting this and the other challenges, maintaining their lead- ing position in the market while developing new relationships with
new clients, all the indications are that LPC is not a company content to rest on its laurels.
Cooper adds: “What we’re trying to break out of is the idea that we are a big corporate playout centre. A lot of peo- ple think we’re just here to service inter- nal clients. Absolutely not true. The internal business for us is very small. We are a facilities house, but in the past had never promoted that image.
“Our style is approachable, client focused, all the things you’d expect from a good facilities house. And the most important thing is we deliver the best service possible.” ■ ANWAR BRETT
Photos from top: LPC’s Studio One and Studio Two
EXPOSURE • 10