The newly-formed Real Media Collective has held its first yearly meet-up, with big industry players attending to celebrate the year.
Photos from the night can be seen on the Australian Printer gallery page here.
With its strong catalogue focus, reflecting its Australasian Catalogue Association origins, there were executives from IVE Group, PMP, and Salmat attending, along with Print NZ’s Ruth Cobb.
Kellie Northwood, CEO, RMC, told guests, “We collaborate and educate. In February/March we will be holding our first Real Media Collective seminar. This is for customers, retailers, and agencies, and we will be hosting them across Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne, and will look at all sectors of print.
“We will have half an hour rotating shifts of direct mail, packaging, catalogue letterbox, publishing. The retailers and customers in the audience might have an understanding of catalogues and not others, so we can open them up to direct mail, or others.
“We will be having our Real Media Awards in Melbourne on August 30. Predominantly it has been owned by the catalogue sector, but over the years we have added more categories of print. This year we will add magazines, and publishing. It is now the Collective Awards. It is not a print awards night, as we already have that. This is about the effectiveness of our channel.
“We are also looking at how we can promote print to young people, and get more videos and work experience access out to 16-17 year olds.
“We need to make sure our industry lives for many years, and future-proof it.”
Kevin Slaven, chairman, RMC, and CEO, PMP, says, “It is great to get the industry together, especially this time of year. As our businesses, and the industry evolves, the associations that support the industry need to evolve as well.
“I think we would agree that Kellie has done a staggering job, and shown great leadership and dedication this year in particular.”
Slaven also acknowledged Matt Aitken of IVE Group, PMP’s direct competitor, along with Rebecca Lowde of Salmat.
He explains, “Even though we are competitors are pretty fierce competitors out there, when it comes to supporting the industry we understand the need for us to talk. We have the associations to give us the opportunity to do that.
“Gone are the days where there is blood on the streets between the competitors. It is important that we acknowledge as an industry that we need to keep an open dialogue, and I do thank Rebecca and Matt for continuing to do so with me.”
David Webster, Salmat, says, “All I can say as I depart from the industry, is our success and our future has to be around how well we all collaborate together as an industry. We are in the best position now that we have ever been in that respect. We understand how much we need each other, to make sure that this industry remains a force, and continues to be sustainable.
“I think the print media industry is fantastic. It’s funny, old things become new again, and there is a big future for us if we get it right, and keep talking about how effective this channel is.”
The Collective is also building a new membership tier structure, following the amalgamation of multiple bodies ACA, APIA, and TSA limited. Members will now have one set of fees, with the full breakdown expected to be released soon by RMC.
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