Management and staff at APN Print New Zealand have received some relief from the company’s recent re-organisations with success in the newspaper component of this year’s Pride In Print Awards, earning gold medals for the New Zealand Herald and Wairarapa Times Age and a highly commended citation for the Bay of Plenty Times.
Dan Blackbourn, general manager of APN Print New Zealand says, “Even though we as company are undergoing some changes at present, the fact that our various sites are featuring in the Awards is testimony to the quality and dedication of our teams. Well done to them for their focus. The four gold medals were shared across our Manukau, Ellerslie, Hastings and Tauranga sites and the highly commended citations were earned by Manukau and Tauranga.”
He believes the awards recognition owes much to a company-wide focus on quality. He says, “It was particularly pleasing to see the Hastings plant return to the winners’ table. The quality of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau work has seen this job adopted by advertising agencies as an illustration of what can print well in newspapers.”
Sue Archibald, awards manager Pride In Print says, “Earlier in the year I was asked to come in and discuss entry with the various APN sites during a group marketing meeting. APN views Pride In Print as an opportunity to get quality benchmarking from their industry peers and challenges the individual plants to put their best work forward for scrutiny. It certainly has worked -- they have taken all advice on board and come out triumphant.”
The company also picked up gold medals for the Stevens Christmas Catalogue and Newspaper Advertising Bureau New Zealand work, as well as highly commended citations for the Simply You Living, Mindfood, Taste and Your Home & Garden titles and a Harvey Norman catalogue.
