Magazine & eMedia Publishing Professional & Social Network
Alan Darling's Page
Profile Information
- Media Type:
- Publishing, eMedia, Newspaper, Service Provider
- Media Realm:
- Consumer Media, Business Media, Associations, City & Regional, Niche/Enthusiast
- Home Region:
- Mid Atlantic
- Past Companies & Brands
- Vio Inc, Quality House of Graphics, Western Laser Graphics, Quad/Graphics, Monotype
- I'm Looking For:
- Friends, Networking, Jobs, Inspiration
- Professional Background: (Resume)
- SUMMARY OF QUALIFICATIONS
NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT
NEW PRODUCT LAUNCHES
MARKET PENETRATION
SALES MANAGEMENT
TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS
HIGH LEVEL NEGOTIATIONS
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
STRATEGIC PLANNING
BUSINESS ALLIANCES
Sales- and marketing-focused executive with extensive experience in company growth and management including P&L Responsibility, Sales Force Development, Operations, Product Development, Company Turn Around, Acquisition, Acquisition Integration and sought internationally as a speaker on Industry Technology Best Practices.
Opened and maintained national accounts including:
Magazines: Time Inc., Meredith Corporation, UBM, Hearst
Newspapers: Gannett, New York Times, Associated Newspapers, Trinity Mirror
Agencies: DraftFCB, McCann Erikson, Publicis
Retailers: Macys, Dillard’s, JCPenney
Open to relocation.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
VIO INC – Cranbury, NJ 2003 – Present
Executive Vice President
Vio Inc is a subsidiary of Vio Worldwide, a $12 million per year, 60 person graphic arts supply chain software and services company. Reporting directly to the CEO, the original purpose of the hire was to raise Vio’s profile in the US. This position has expanded to strategic business development, sales management, direct sales and product development activities.
• Raised the profile of Vio in the publishing, prepress and ad agency markets in the US.
• Sold into key national accounts – most notably Time Inc., Meredith, New York Times, UBM, Macys, Dillard’s and Draft FCB.
• Managed national, virtual sales team of six people.
• Negotiated reseller agreements to enhance direct sales reach.
• Successfully designed and launched the world’s first digital soft proofing ad delivery service that lead to over $1.2 million per year in recurring revenue.
• Worked with standards organizations to move the standards forward and to ensure that they were capable of implementation for both Vio and the rest of the industry.
• Member of M&A team – most notably the December 2006 acquisition of the rights to AdSEND from the Associated Press.
QUALITY HOUSE OF GRAPHICS – Long Island City, NY 2001 – 2003
Chief Operating Officer, Chief Technology Officer
Recruited by $20 million advertising agency prepress and commercial print shop, one of New York’s top five, to direct 200 personnel in overall company operations. The position reported to the President and was responsible for coordinating efforts of sales and technology, prioritizing operational issues and customer concerns and developing technology strategies. Duties included negotiating with vendors and candidates of mergers and acquisitions.
The company closed in March 2003.
• Designed corporate marketing plan, including development and repackaging of products.
• Developed educational seminar series that educated and attracted clients.
• Dramatically increased company productivity by employing state-of-the-art technology.
• Designed new production and tracking system, including vendor negotiation that obtained $800,000 of equipment at a cash-neutral position for the company.
• Created new quality control procedures that significantly reduced error rates.
• Designed and implemented corporate sales database that increased interactivity with clients and prospects.
WESTERN LASER GRAPHICS, INCORPORATED – Valencia, California 1995 – 2001
President and Chief Operating Officer
Selected to turn around $4 million, 90-person publication prepress firm for absentee owner. Responsible for P&L and all operations including strategic planning, sales, marketing, technology and negotiations.
• Evaluated and analyzed sales force and client perspectives on firm’s strengths and weaknesses, packaging resulting vision as marketing platform.
• Developed a formal product plan and used it to redirect the sales force in both LA and NY.
• Directly managed the sales force to more than double revenue to over $9 million in three years in a market where competitive pressure had cut prices in half.
• Designed and implemented two production systems and a job ticketing and tracking system to streamline production and cut costs.
• Transformed company from analog to digital production, recognized as a leader in publication community.
QUAD/GRAPHICS, INCORPORATED – Pewaukee, Wisconsin 1986 – 1995
Marketing Director, Quad/Imaging 1993 – 1995
Promoted for successful development of key marketing strategies within the then $700 million, 7,000-employee firm that is one of the top five web and gravure printers of magazines and catalogs in the United States. Responsible for balancing responsibilities and efforts between developing marketing strategy for Quad/Imaging and development Quad/Dimensional Imaging business.
• Coalesced print and prepress sales forces, fusing sales efforts of 60-member print sales team and 10-member prepress sales team that addressed national and local accounts from four sales offices in the US.
• Developed training materials and sessions that educated print sales force on prepress capabilities.
• Cohesive sales efforts demonstrated added value to clients, increasing sales 20% in the first year.
General Manager, Quad/Dimensional Imaging 1993 – 1995
Selected to re-engineer and revitalize existing division that produced three-dimensional and motion, lenticular printing. Tasked to develop sales and marketing strategy to leverage high production rates.
• Overcame inefficient production by refining overall process.
• Successfully identified target market and demonstrated cost-effective, high quality product.
• Drove annual sales from less than $500,000 to more than $2 million in two years.
General Manager, Quad/Text 1986 – 1993
Recruited to create new division to “take prepress back to the clients.” Responsible for designing new process that provided the first tightly coupled desktop to Color Electronic Prepress System (CEPS) link and developed the Automatic Picture Replacement (APR) capability. Staffed complete division with sales support, customer support and engineering personnel to implement product and associated services.
• Spearheaded development of ADEPT service that implemented new process, providing equipment acquisition, training and final print production and establishing market for desktop publishing.
• Directed groundbreaking license negotiations with Bitstream to include font libraries in new product.
• Transformed $500,000 investment in hardware and software into annual sales of $20 million.
• Successful deployment of desktop services resulted in promotion to Marketing Director of prepress group.
THE MONOTYPE CORPORATION, LTD. – Redhill, England and Chicago, IL 1974 – 1986
Director, OEM Sales and Marketing (US) 1983 – 1986
Technical Director (US) 1982 – 1986
Technical Support Manager (US) 1980 – 1982
Special Projects Manager (UK) 1977 – 1980
Support Analyst and Product Evaluation Analyst (UK) 1974 – 1977
Joined Monotype immediately after graduating and held several positions evaluating software and hardware systems. Key successes were developing and launching a Chinese language phototypesetting system and installing it in the Peoples’ Republic of China in 1979, and a Yellow Page production system.
In 1980, the company offered a transfer to newly opened Chicago office to head up technical support. Promotion to Technical Director, with responsibilities to develop product specifically for the US market, was followed by a further additional responsibility to develop a strategy to develop and sell subsystems of the Monotype end-user product range as OEM elements. The most successful being sales into a then-emerging Adobe Systems in 1984.
EDUCATION
KING’S COLLEGE London, England
Graduated in 1974 with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical and Electronic Engineering
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS
MPA eBusiness Task Force (founding member) 6 Months
AdsML Steering Committee 1 Year
Ebiz for Media Committee (Founding Gateway) 2 Years
P3 Planning Committee 5 Years
Digital Distribution of Advertising for Publications Association, Chairman 11 Years
Ghent PDF Workgroup 3 Years
CGATS SC6 12 Years
Apple Computer Customer Advisory Board 1 1/2 Years
NeXT Computer Graphic Arts Advisory Board 1 Year
LA Digital Ad Lab Chapter, Chairman 2 Years
Western Publications Association Board 5 Years
MacWeek Graphic Arts Advisory Board 2 Years
Seybold speaker 13 Years
PROFESSIONAL AWARDS
Digital Distribution of Advertising for Publications, Founders Award 1999
PERSONAL
Married with two children. Hobbies include travel and Koi. Prepared to relocate.
- Education:
- BS in Electrical Engineering from King's College, London
- Other Web Profile or Personal Web Site
- http://www.linkedin.com/in/alanjdarling
- Relationship Status:
- Married
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