Who knew that document solutions and football were so closely related! Capture and partners at Konica Minolta are proud to have football legend Ronaldinho on the same side as he epitomises success. The document solutions firm knows all about success having achieved turnover of over two million in their second year of operation which they attribute to their fantastic team ethic.
Former Highland League Footballers, Colin Yule and Robbie Cheyne set up their team at Capture Imaging Solutions in October 2005. Since then the business has gone from strength to strength and forecasted to exceed turnover expectations into the future.
Colin and Robbie recognise that their success is down to the players they have. The 12-strong team of staff have contributed to Capture’s success in providing document and imaging solutions to companies across Scotland.
Like football, Capture’s journey has been a game of two halfs with their continued success seeing them almost double turnover year-on-year. Here Robbie Cheyne, Director of Capture outlines their approach to business:
Talking tactics – Outlining the strategic business plan is important for any company. Whether it’s advertising, public relations or operational strategy we involve the whole team in our planning process. We moved our service team in-house to ensure that we can deliver the full Capture experience throughout all departments. But we don’t restrict this to just the Capture team, we’ve found external team members who can enhance our marketing and public profile too.
Pre–season training – We ensure that the whole team is fit and fully prepared, just as a manager would of his team before a match. Our team regularly attend training events in order to hone their skills to the benefit of our business. Being a Konica Minolta partner means that we can also take advantage of their world-wide support programmes for our team. We ensure that our sales team are fully equipped in all aspects of the capabilities of the Konica Minolta machines whether it be copying, scanning, printing, faxing or using document management software. The same goes for our service team.
Team colours - Capture has a team ‘strip’ for all employees which add to the “team” image of the business. The uniform is a black Berghaus fleece, grey V-Neck jumpers customised with the Capture Imaging Solutions logo and a crisp white shirt with logo to the breast. The uniform is finished off with black trousers and shoes.
We have created a sense of staff pride and a sense of belonging - and you need a good strip to go with a good team.
Sponsorship – Our partners, Konica Minolta, are affiliated Ronaldinho. We feel that as a star player in the copier market the association with a star player adds to our strength in the document solutions game.
Team formation – We believe our success lies in the strength of our team. Key positions on the field are:
1 - Lynda Clark (Administration)
2 - Elaine Stewart (Administration)
3 - Scott Simpson (Operations Manager)
4 - Graham Gray (Sales Director)
5 - Colin Yule (Director)
6 - Gary Thow (Service Manager)
7 - Raymond Watt (Account Manager)
8 - Liam Smith (Account Manager)
9 - Mike Milne (Service Engineer)
10 - Darren Hepburn (Service Engineer)
11 - Greg Napier (Service Engineer)
Bench – Robbie Cheyne (Director)
Big name signing – Our ability to win lucrative contracts is evident in our financial performance. This year we won a major contract worth around half a million pounds which continues to spur our success.
The reason we win major contracts is thanks to the great team we have working for us and the solutions we provide. Equipment-wise our star player at the moment is the Konica Minolta Bizhub C550 machine which incorporates photocopying, printing, scanning, faxing and most resourcefully, filing. This means that document management is made much easier as documents can be scanned and added to a file without the need for dusting off folders on a shelf. We are also moving into software solutions for document management that will search for files and store them more efficiently.
The stadium – The Capture operation is slick, we ensure that the office surroundings are conducive to helping the team work together. We’ve already had a move in Aberdeen to our new offices in Altens. Having the right resources on the ground is imperative for continuing to build Capture’s ability to grow across Scotland.
Consider the offside trap – We monitor what the opposing teams (our competitors) might be doing. Office machinery and document management is a highly competitive sector. Keeping our eye on the competition means we keep our competitive winning advantage. Of course, this means they are probably keeping a close eye on us too, but we take that as a compliment!
Win bonus – Making sure our staff are looked after through providing staff benefits from commission on sales to organising a night out is important to us. In an aggressive job market, where companies are desperate to secure the right calibre of staff, employers have to take a holistic approach to looking after employees. The salary package is always going to be the most important thing, but there’s a growing trend towards potential employees looking beyond this to the culture of the organisation to see if this is the sort of place they will be happy at work.
First half – Our year-end results in 2006 saw tremendous growth with post season profits of £1.5 million. In just 12 months, Capture signed over 80 clients and installed more than 230 machines across the north east. Projected turn over and profits for the current year are on track to beat this significantly with many major new contract wins in 2007.
Second half – With results like £2.2 million, our second year has exceeded all expectations. We have many strong forwards (sales team) and experienced physios, complete with magic sponge, (engineers) it’s thanks to them we continue to play a good game.
Final whistle – Make sure you get the results you plan and by the final whistle you will be reaping the results.
Scouting – At Capture, our scouts are always looking out for talented players to join our successful team. In the future we may look to take on engineers to strengthen our position in the document solutions league.
Silver wear – It’s great to get recognition from your peers. We were awarded three separate recognitions at the prestigious Konica Minolta Award ceremony in London which celebrates the best of the country’s leading Konica Minolta suppliers. At the ceremony, Capture Imaging came third in the UK for sales of total office colour products. Co-founder of Capture, Colin Yule was awarded a trip to a Caribbean island as a prize for achieving this status. As well as this huge success, we were also named as the most improved dealer in the UK, whilst also receiving a special recognition achievement at the awards.
Capture has also scooped the New Business Awards at the Grampian Awards for Business Enterprise, proving that even in your first season you can scoop the silverwear.
Robbie gives a post-match breakdown of his team’s performance and plans for the future:
“This year our performance has exceeded our expectations and we will better that next year with the hard work of our team. We recognise that the players we have help us to be the market leader in solving document conundrums. At Capture we can put your current fax, printer, photocopier or scanner on the transfer list and sign you a star player who does it all!”
