stichd: "A wood-paneled solution where with a good DAM system there is a lot to gain.

Once started stichd making privatelabel socks for Hema. Today, in addition to socks, they also make underwear, swimwear and fanwear and are brand partners with brands such as PUMA, Levi's, Tommy Hilfiger and HEAD. Brands that are, to put it mildly, quite fashionable, and stichd must seamlessly match them in terms of collection and feel. Comrads' digital asset management system helps stichd handle their content more efficiently and accurately.

Wood Rope

Until recently, stichd's marketing department kept the content they created in folders on an internal work drive. That was their Image bank. That way of working had quite a few limitations. Huub Sijbers, Business Consultant at stichd: "We no longer knew where which version of a piece of content was stored, what the latest version was, and we made adjustments without having any way of documenting them. If we shared something with customers, we no longer knew which version it had been and whether they were still using it. To work with our photography suppliers, we used yet another solution. In short, a wood-panel solution where with a good digital asset management system there is a lot to gain.'

Inventory of needs and requirements

'At the end of 2018, together with an internal project group, I started taking stock of the wishes and requirements from the business. One of the brands we serve was already working with Comrads' solution and was very satisfied with it. When we had mapped out the wishes and requirements and it was time to invite a number of parties for a demo and an interview, Comrads was one of them. Their approach to the implementation best matched what we needed at that time.'

Growing into the solution

'We had nothing and didn't want to go straight to a very large platform. That would be too comprehensive, which would be detrimental to adoption and make the implementation process endless. With Comrads, you can buy the solution by functionality, which allows you to grow in your solution. Moreover, the people at Comrads work very pragmatically and we were able to switch quickly. It just works very pleasant. The pricing was also an important factor; the price is not determined by the number of users, but by the number of modules and extra functionalities you purchase.

Personally involved

'Comrads is certainly not the biggest party, but that suits us just fine. They have a lot of experience and are very good at thinking along in solutions that fit the phase we are in. And I'm not just referring to the system, the workflow and adjusting the internal systems, but also how we can make it as easy as possible for our colleagues to adopt all that news. That's where they really excel as far as we're concerned. They don't blindly put away a system, but are personally involved. That feels good.

Solution in four areas

'A digital asset management system is going to help us on several levels. Internally, it will help us share the content we create with each other more easily and efficiently. Suppliers of photographic material, for example, should be able to log into our portal to see what they still have to shoot. Towards customers, it is a means to provide supporting material that belongs to the collection they purchase. Finally, there are the brands we serve: with them we need to be able to easily share things like product information and photo material so that they too can start offering it on their platforms to the customers they have in their portfolios.'

Fully operational

'We have completed the softlaunch internally. Now it's time to fix some teething problems and refine some processes a little further. I hope to have our new DAM system fully operational in May. It certainly won't be down to the cooperation with Comrads.

Curious?

Want to talk further about what a Digital Asset Management system can do for your organization and how to make its use a success? Feel free to contact us for a free on-site demo. We are happy to think along with you.