In today’s fast-paced, evolving world, both marketplace and industry are continually compelled to develop new and creative ways to engage with consumers. Consumers are increasingly demanding products, services, and spaces to be more tightly focused around their personal lifestyle and interests, driving retailers, entertainment providers, and service industries to respond with more personalized and relevant marketing and merchandising. With this direct correlation between consumer experience and brand loyalty, balancing consumer expectations, brand image, and budget has become a real challenge for marketers.
Visual communications are highly effective when you understand your consumers, invest in-fit-for-purpose tools, and have a clear strategy to ensure success. Your visual solutions must go beyond simple messaging to deliver interesting, unique, relevant, and memorable content and experience. That’s where Imagine! has really found its niche, becoming an invaluable partner by helping marketers go beyond run-of-the-mill campaigns to achieve more meaningful impact, influence, and wins in the marketplace.
Based out of Minnesota, Imagine! provides full-service visual marketing solutions for clients across the retail, entertainment, gaming, quick-serve/fast casual restaurant, and CPG industries. The Imagine! Companies are comprised of Imagine! Print Solutions; Imagine! Express; Midnight Oil Agency; and Classic Graphics. As a family of visual communication experts, Imagine! leverages its complementary skills and capabilities in order to design, produce, and deliver meaningful experiences and successful consumer outcomes for its clients.
Imagine! Print Solutions
Imagine! Print Solutions offers one of the broadest arrays of print processes and finishing options in the nation. The platform strives to be the supplier of choice for customer engagement by providing end-to-end solutions for complex, brand-based marketing and design needs.
Imagine! Express
Imagine! Express specializes in fast turns, short runs, and service beyond imagination. From vibrant dye-sublimated fabric textiles to variable commercial printing to super-sized environmental graphics, every project is handled with the highest standards and an eye on the deadline.
Midnight Oil
Midnight Oil drives creative agency offerings, delivering dynamic, inspired solutions that invoke meaningful connections and experiences. Based in Burbank, California, near the epicenter of the entertainment industry, their passionate team works to influence, shape, and redefine cultural values with insightful messaging that elevates and engages consumers.
Classic Graphics
Classic runs an award-winning graphics communications manufacturing operation, delivering advanced technological capabilities and cutting-edge expertise from their strategic position in the Southeastern U.S. With a comprehensive range of services, they are dedicated to protecting brands, optimizing budgets, and delivering impactful results.
The Conception and Evolution of the Company
Bob Lothenbach founded Imagine! Print Solutions in 1988 with a single borrowed press. His vision, unwavering determination, and commitment to outstanding service allowed the business to defy all odds and grow from local to regional and national esteem.
Over the last thirty years, the Imagine! family of companies has weathered market and industry challenges without losing focus on the customer, adapting to meet increasing client expectations and an ever-evolving marketplace. Today, Imagine! has evolved from the operation in Lothenbach’s garage to become a recognized industry powerhouse and a leader in POP/POS production for North America.
A significant portion of Imagine!’s robust growth has included the acquisitions of DigiGraphics (renamed Imagine! Express) in 2012; Classic Graphics in 2013; and Midnight Oil Agency in 2016. As part of Lothenbach’s vision for continued growth, he partnered with Oak Hill Capital Partners, a private equity firm headquartered in New York, in March of 2016 to provide the additional horsepower needed to drive Imagine! further than ever before.
In addition, Oak Hill worked to support Lothenbach’s vision for Imagine!’s future by transitioning his role to a new leader. John Hans joined the Imagine! family in 2016 as enterprise CEO, bringing a proven record of leadership success and broad-based experience as a part of companies like Proctor & Gamble, IBM, Heinz, and Yum! Brands. Beyond his commitment to achieving superior operational performance, Hans’ primary aim is to position the Imagine! family of companies as world-class visual communications providers, delivering clients unmatched service and innovation.
Delivering Value Creates Value
Imagine! prides itself in having the people, the experience, the equipment, the creativity, and the passion to bring any project to life. Their holistic capabilities, varied service offerings, and trusted insights allow their clients to depend on them as a single source for every visual communications challenge, question, idea, and inspiration.
Team Imagine! prioritizes innovation and invests in the newest technology to help their clients continually improve the efficacy and impact of their campaigns. The company’s equipment acquisitions, technology initiatives, and creative processes are directly influenced by the needs of their clients and the consumers they serve.
Well-versed in managing complex, integrated marketing programs, Imagine! approaches each challenge with a solutions-mindset and a determination to deliver impactful executions that create traffic, increase transactions, and build brand loyalty. By treating clients as strategic partners rather than buyers, Imagine! is able to continually learn, grow, and improve in accordance with their clients’ needs to deliver successful and relevant results now and in the future.
Dedicated Services & the Methodology to Thrive
The Imagine! Companies collectively specialize in design-to-delivery execution, providing innovative creative expertise and from-scratch structural engineering as well as high-quality print manufacturing. Their national print segments include point of purchase, packaging, commercial, flexography, textile, digital, UV, and screen print. Beyond their design, printing, kitting, and fulfillment capabilities, the company provides campaign management tools, insightful thought leadership, and custom solutions to help their clients design more sophisticated go-to-market strategies. A comprehensive view of the organization’s services is given below:
Imagine! Print Solutions executes high-profile national campaigns and exacting brand standards on the industry’s tightest timelines—every single day. Their wide range of products includes: In-store signage, Temporary POP displays, Permanent signage, Displays & fixtures, Product packaging & Commercial collateral.
Imagine! Express offers a complete range of in-house print capabilities designed to transform spaces and elevate brands. Production specialties include: Dye-sublimated fabric graphics, Large & grand-format graphics, In-store signage, Commercial mailing & Marketing collateral.
Imagine! FLEXO is an operating unit of Imagine! Print Solutions, offering a comprehensive suite of flexographic solutions. Products include: Prime Labels, Coupons, Onserts, Specialty/Promotional (game pieces, scratch-offs, etc.), Shrink Sleeves, Flexible Packaging & Labeling Equipment.
Midnight Oil is known for creative expertise that brings brands to life, goes beyond the bottom line, and explodes the status quo. They provide: Brand experience (360-degree marketing strategy, website/platform development, etc.), Digital (video, social media, live streaming, etc.), Creative, Promotional, and Commercial content & Print services.
Classic Graphics serves top national and international brands with a sharpened focus on consumer responsiveness. Their specialties include: Commercial mailing, Secure communications, Promotional signage, POP displays & Data and digital asset management.
Imagine! and its family of companies has received numerous awards for excellence in print quality and innovation, and is nationally known as one of the most progressive and fastest-growing print companies. Rated among the Top 15 Printers in the nation, Imagine! has extensive experience delivering solutions to some of the most respected brands in North America.
Serving as Brand Partners
Imagine! works directly alongside its clients to thoroughly understand their brand and meet their specific marketing needs with value-engineered services and custom, optimized solutions. They have uniquely positioned themselves as fully integrated partners, leveraging both dynamic agency capability and robust production and deployment services.
Imagine! boasts a long and proud history of delivering client-specific solutions and managing complex, integrated marketing programs. The family of companies operates on a never satisfied, flexible, client-first business model that looks for continuous improvement at every opportunity. With a dynamic team of strategic problem-solvers, creative artists, and expert craftsmen, they work to elevate brands and engage consumers through meaningful connections and experiences that inspire.
Evolving Strategies with Changing Times in Merchandising
With today’s consumers increasingly seeking more convenient, personal, and exciting experiences, marketers are continually compelled to develop new and creative ways to engage with them. In this rapidly changing marketplace, Imagine! is a beacon of confidence and leadership, always ready to adapt, evolve, and innovate to meet their clients’ needs. Imagine! continually strives to deliver insight-driven creativity and design, value-engineered products and services, and superior execution of contingency and hyper-local campaigns.
Imagine! works closely with marketers to develop engaging and consistent branding through full, coordinated strategies that include insightful concepts, dynamic structural displays, smart merchandising, and relevant, targeted messaging. They provide their clients with effective, value-engineered solutions, enabling them to create immersive experiences, positive impressions, and meaningful connections between the consumer and brand that ultimately increases transactions and maximizes ROI.
Today and in the future, Imagine! envisions positioning itself as a partner that helps to drive consumer outcomes. They continue to focus on ensuring their capabilities and services tightly align with the goals, objectives and desired outcomes of their clients.
Envisioning Major Leaps through Future Endeavors
Imagine! looks forward to continually enhancing its core creative and print manufacturing capabilities, staying ahead of the competition with investments in industry-leading technology and innovation. In addition to their ongoing commitment to provide best-in-class POP execution, they are emphasizing growth in their agency and brand communication capabilities through organic expansion and strategic acquisitions.
Imagine! has several new equipment acquisitions in the works, with an emphasis on amplifying their ability to produce high-speed, high-quality print and allow their clients to take advantage of high- capacity message versioning for targeted, localized marketing programs. The company also envisions expanding their service offerings at Classic Graphics and their digital press capacity at their Midnight Oil facility. Imagine! will continue to work diligently to develop their campaign management technology offerings, allowing clients to design sophisticated marketing strategies around location, demographics, and demand in order to deliver optimized messaging to the right place at the right time.
Imagine! will continue driving positive consumer outcomes through broadened solutions capabilities that bridge digital and physical solutions to elevate shopping experiences and connect consumers to brands. Through greater supply chain efficiencies, channel-relevant insights, and immersive in-store executions, they will continue enabling their clients to create more sophisticated marketing strategies. Above all, Imagine! is dedicated to embracing every future challenge as an opportunity to provide service and execution beyond limits, beyond ordinary, and beyond print.
Source :- The 10 Most Innovative Merchandising Solution Providers 2017
