Westchester Publishing Services

Excellence Delivered

Westchester Wrap-up: Summer 2019

UK

by Nicole Tomassi, Marketing & Conference Manager

In the summer months, the pace typically slows down, allowing an opportunity to relax and enjoy the longer, warmer days summertime offers up. While all of us at Westchester made sure to take some time to spend with friends and family, we were still working hard to make sure all of our publishers’ projects were moving along through the pre-press stages. Here’s a quick wrap-up of what we did this past summer:

Collaborative partnership

Dropbox is one of the members of Westchester’s Partner Network, and their Dropbox Business suite of products helps us to remain connected internally as well as with our freelance resources and client publishers to flow project assets to each other within a secure framework. Check out this video that Dropbox produced over the summer that shows how Dropbox applications help support Westchester’s development initiatives, including our Client Portal.

Westchester profiled in Publishers Weekly

In early August, Westchester Publishing Services was featured in the Publishers Weekly annual Digital Solutions in India issue. In the article, Chief Revenue Officer, Tyler M. Carey, explains how the company is prepared for continued growth during the next decade, and reflects on the significant milestone of 50 years of serving publishers’ pre-press requirements, along with reaching the fifth anniversary of being a 100% employee-owned company.

Meet Dilip Chacko

Shortly before the Digital Solutions in India article was published, I had the opportunity to speak at length with Dilip Chacko, Founder and Managing Director of our wholly-owned composition facility in Chennai, India. It was an extremely informative discussion encompassing Dilip’s career, his guiding principles, and how his focus on providing high quality applies to client projects as well as the employees who work on them.

Client Portal Update

In the spring edition of the Westchester Wrap-up, we shared how the Client Portal had been shortlisted for the Stationers’ Company Innovation in Excellence Award. Not content to rest on our laurels (or nominations), we are continually adding capabilities to the Client Portal to better serve the requirements our clients have. Last month, we conducted a webinar demonstrating several of the helpful features that make publisher workflows more efficient throughout the pre-press production process.

UK conferences

While July and August are quieter months from a working standpoint, the pace tends to move faster with September’s arrival. Tim Davies, Managing Director of Westchester Publishing Services UK, was particularly busy last month meeting with publishing industry professionals at the ALPSP (The Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers) Conference, and the IPG (Independent Publishers Guild) Autumn Conference. Prior to those conferences, Tim shared some helpful insights for independent publishers in this IPG podcast.

Next Generation Science Standards

If you haven’t been in the classroom for a decade or more, you might be surprised at how much more proficient students are required to be when it comes to understanding scientific concepts. Our STEM Content Director, Dave Bailis, explains how a more effective science curriculum is being implemented around the country to help prepare students for a world that is more reliant on science and technology than in previous generations.

In the Community

Earlier this year, our Westchester K-12 division implemented a program where each month one member of the team selects a project to fund from the thousands that are submitted to DonorsChoose.org by public school teachers. These projects are often for schools where the majority of students are from low-income communities that aren’t able to access much-needed classroom resources through traditional funding avenues. During the summer, STEM Content Director, Dave Bailis, and Director of Creative Services, Mark DaGrossa, each had the opportunity to fulfill a teacher request that was meaningful to them.

Meet with us this fall (and beyond)!

We’re attending and exhibiting at several conferences during the next few months, including Frankfurt Book Fair next week, FutureBook in London this November, and the SIIA Education Business Forum taking place this December in New York City. If you will be attending any of these events, let’s catch up! Make an appointment to connect with us, and be sure to visit our Conferences and Events page where we will be regularly adding information about the conferences Westchester will be attending or exhibiting at in 2020.

You don’t need to wait for a conference to speak with our knowledgeable staff about how our fifty years of experience in providing editorial, composition, and design services can help you produce quality publications while condensing schedules and trimming pre-press expenses. Contact us today to learn how Westchester’s consultative approach can benefit your projects.

 

by Tyler M. Carey, Chief Revenue Officer

I saw this post in my Google News feed a week or so ago, and put it aside to consider.  CNBC reported on the UK’s Booksellers’ Association’s latest study, cementing the trend we’ve talked about before at Westchester – that the gap between print and ebook sales for most publishers continues to widen following the peak and collapse of ebook sales several years ago.  Those numbers aren’t anything any of my colleagues and customers in most markets are arguing with, but the Booksellers’ Association’s analysis went several layers deeper than the usual headlines reported as soundbites on 24-hour news networks.

In publishing, we’ve talked about how ‘sticky’ print books can be for kids, versus in the Fire or iPad world where kids are likely to move on to apps or interactives rather than read a one-to-one digital adaptation of a print book.  When given a print book, many educators and publishers have noticed that kids are more likely to prefer it over the digital edition.  At the same time, in the classroom children are engaging with and benefiting from the work of EdTech companies that are developing apps and platforms to help with adaptive learning and added support for students who learn in different ways.

The Booksellers’ Association study goes layers deeper than the usual trade vs. cookbook vs. children’s book argument that most analysis seems to focus on.  It’s well worth the brief read, talking about the buying habits and reading habits of millennials and more, providing some surprising results.

by Nicole Tomassi, Marketing & Conference Manager

When you select a vendor to handle typesetting services for your projects, you need to have a strong degree of confidence that the firm you choose has people with the skills required to get the job done correctly. How can you assess their capabilities to ensure that the quality of the work is in line with your expectations?

Meet Dilip Chacko, Managing Director of Westchester’s wholly-owned composition subsidiary, based in Chennai, India. I recently had the opportunity to talk with Dilip to learn more about his career in the typesetting business, and how he came to be a part of the Westchester Publishing Services team.

Dilip joined the typesetting profession in 1998 after spending 15 years with advertising firm J. Walter Thompson, where he rose to the position of Senior Vice President. Advertising and typesetting may not seem similar, however, Dilip points out there is a design aspect that is prominent in each profession.

Dilip invested four years into learning the composition trade at a Chennai-based firm that handled journals for a major publisher, and in 2002 made the move to owner-operator when he started Antares Publishing Services. Dilip’s primary objective was that the company earn and maintain a reputation for providing excellent service to its customers. One key way to ensure this is by handling all aspects of a composition job including quality control in-house. This is an important distinction because many overseas typesetting firms will send work to unvetted third parties who may not possess the necessary qualifications to complete the job, negatively impacting the quality of the finished product. This attention to quality impressed us, and in 2008, Westchester acquired Dilip’s firm to provide typesetting services exclusively for Westchester publisher clients.

From the beginning, Dilip understood the importance of assessing the capabilities of every applicant who wanted to work for his company, even if they had worked for other typesetters. Every person that applies must take a screening test, with only 1 in 10 applicants able to pass the rigorous skills assessment. New employees then undergo a comprehensive training program, spending several weeks learning the proper way to perform all aspects of the job and passing additional skill assessments before being allowed to work on client projects. The training doesn’t end there either, as employees continually learn additional skills that allow them to step into other roles throughout the business to provide seamless coverage wherever it’s needed. Many employees from the company’s earliest days are still here today because of their knowledge and attention to detail.

Dilip thinks of his role like that of a medical professional, making sure all parts of the typesetting operation are functioning in a healthy way. He ensures staff members gain the right experience through regular and refresher training, and by learning each client’s preferred procedures and requirements so that their projects can be delivered in a timely manner and to a standard of quality that won’t be found anywhere else. Dilip’s team possesses the wide variety of skills needed to understand the unique print and digital requirements of our clients, from writing hundreds of scripts specific to typesetting, understanding complex LaTeX content and developing templates to help our clients, and countless other transformations and applications, including the underlying technology that is used in our secure Client Portal.

Now that you know more about Dilip and his leadership of the skilled team members at our India-based composition services operation, it’s easy to understand why Westchester wanted to form a partnership. In the next blog post, we’ll explain how this mutually beneficial arrangement began.

by Nicole Tomassi, Marketing & Conference Manager

We’re halfway through our 50th year in business, and Westchester Publishing Services has continued to be very productive in several areas! Here are a few of the highlights from this past spring:

The Westchester K-12 Team Welcomes Walter

Walter Henderson, Jr., Senior Supervising Editor, English Language Training In April the Westchester K-12 Product Development team grew when Walter Henderson, Jr., joined the team as Senior Supervising Editor for ELT (English Language Training). Walter has an impressive professional background as a classroom instructor both in the United States and overseas, as well as working with academic institutions and publishers to develop suitable course materials for English Language Learners (ELL). Having Walter and his extensive professional network as a part of Westchester K-12 allows us to provide educational, academic, and professional publishers with a wide range of product offerings, including bilingual and translation content to support the specific needs of English Language Learners in educational and business settings.

 

Westchester Publishing Services UK profiled

Coverage about Westchester’s 50th anniversary continued into the spring, with a comprehensive profile in The Bookseller (may require login to read) about our company and the factors that brought us to further expand the business into the UK market, under the guidance of Managing Director of Westchester UK, Tim Davies. More coverage about Westchester’s anniversary can be found in these articles.

K-12 Catalog

Westchester K-12 Publishing Services Catalog 2019This spring the Westchester K-12 art and design team produced a comprehensive catalog that showcases the capabilities and services the Product Development team is able to provide educational and ed-tech publishers for new curriculum content or product updates. Download your complimentary copy and let us know how the Westchester K-12 team can help you.

Client Portal Nominated for Innovation Award

Stationers Company Shortlisted Innovation Excellence Awards 2019In May, we were excited to learn that our Client Portal had been nominated for the Stationers’ Company 2019 Innovation Excellence Awards in the Customer Experience category. To receive this recognition from the Stationers’ Company – a London-based guild with a more than 600-year history of serving members of the publishing and media industries – was a particularly special acknowledgment of the work our technology team has invested into building a project management platform that serves the specific requirements of publishers. This article provides additional information about the newest features we’ve added to the Client Portal to make it even more user-friendly.

British Book Awards

Westchester was proud to be the sponsor for the Academic, Education, and Professional Publisher of the Year category at this year’s British Book Awards which took place in London on May 13.  The awards program is also known as The Nibbies, and draws a veritable Who’s Who of the British publishing industry to recognize the successes of authors and publishers in the previous year.  Additional information about the Books of the Year shortlists and winners is available here.

Association of University Presses

Tom Hartmann and Susan Baker at the 2019 AUP Conference, DetroitIn mid-June, members of Westchester’s sales and editorial teams traveled to Detroit to attend and exhibit at the Association of University Presses annual conference. We always enjoy meeting with our clients at conferences to discuss the latest developments that are having an impact within the industry, and sharing with publishers who may not be familiar with our product offerings the many ways that Westchester’s services can help them to improve their workflows.

In the Community

In the last edition of the Westchester Wrap-up, I shared with you that the Westchester K-12 team had begun an initiative to make a positive difference one classroom at a time. Learn more about the projects that Anne Riccio and Laura Rolfe selected, and how you can help a classroom in your community.

Summer Reading

If you’re looking for a new title or two to add to your reading list, the Westchester staff have some interesting recommendations that you probably won’t find everywhere else. Check out the variety of fiction and non-fiction titles that we’re planning to read this summer, and let us know what you think!

We’ll be on the road at a few key conferences during the remainder of 2019, and planning is well underway for the trade shows Westchester will be attending and exhibiting at next year. The Conferences and Events page will continue to be updated as we confirm our commitments, so check back regularly to see where you can meet with us in person.

You can also keep up with the latest news from Westchester by following us on LinkedIn, and subscribing to our blogs (Westchester and Westchester K-12). Contact us any time to learn how our editorial, typesetting, design, and project management services can help you reduce production time and expense in your publication program.

Enjoy the rest of your summer!
Best,

Nicole Tomassi

 

 

Nicole Tomassi
Marketing & Conference Manager

by Tyler M. Carey, Chief Revenue Officer

Westchester is continually reviewing feedback regarding our Client Portal.  The Client Portal, our no-cost online system for project management, is currently in formal release v. 2019.C.05, but a small, new feature was added this weekend that may make your life a little easier if you are a client with many live projects or articles in the Client Portal at once.  Meet the ability to indicate “Priority” projects in your dashboard.

How does the new “Priority” Star work?  In the Header of the Dashboard you will see a new Star icon next to “Action”. The Star is next to each job you have showing on your Dashboard as well.

This star will allow you to flag a job as a priority for you only.

So, if you have a priority project that you are focusing on, click the Star next to the job and it will change to red. You can then sort on the Star in the header, and all your jobs you flagged as priorities will show at the top of your Dashboard list.

Here are some screenshots to put more context to the above:

Click the Star next to a job and it turns red.

Portal Star 002

Sort on the Star in the header bar, and it will sort all Star jobs to the top.

Portal Star Button

This and other new features will be covered in the new User’s Manual we will be issuing in July.

Lastly, congratulations to Heidelberg UK for winning the Stationers’ Company Innovation Excellence Awards for 2019.  Tim Davies, Managing Director of Westchester Publishing Services UK, represented Westchester at today’s awards ceremony, where The Client Portal was awarded a certificate for being shortlisted for the Customer Experience category.  Congratulations to all our fellow nominees and to Heidelberg for the win!

Tim Davies, 2019 Stationers' Company Innovation Excellence Awards

Do you have suggestions for new features in the Client Portal?  Call your account manager or Contact Us to share your feedback and ideas.