"Colour is essential these days. Bringing in the CF2001 has enabled us to radically rethink our sales strategy." So says Yasuhito Toshiro, Assistant Manager for Information Processing in Koubaitei's Sales Department.

Kotohira Grand Hotel Koubaitei produces its own original brochures and plans on desktop PCs. The plans have to be tailored to individual clients' needs, as they are submitted to specific travel agencies and travel planning offices of corporate customers and other organizations. Each plan takes into account a myriad of details, such as the number of people, the season and the type of food they want prepared. A typical plan will run up to 20 A4 sized pages, all in full colour.

Until a few years ago, producing these documents was an onerous task, and the results were hardly impressive. Staff labored for days producing black-and-white documents in-house on a word processor, while colour sales promotional materials had to be ordered from an outside printing shop.

Kotohira Grand Hotel conducts sales activities with sales offices located throughout Japan - in Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka and Fukuoka. In the past, when sales staff called on prospects, they arrived bearing a standard package of printed materials.

This approach failed to inspire confidence in the chain's prospective clientele. Was Kotohira Grand Hotel capable of creating customised plans, bearing individual customers' names and reflecting particular tastes and wishes? Or did the company simply offer the same package to all visitors? In every corner of the country, Sales staff continued to request customised plans. "No, we want this kind of plan." and " Create the plan this way."

A few years ago Mr. Toshiro launched a process where by staff prepared individual travel plans in-house. "I reasoned that if we produced tailor-made plans for each customer, it would be easier to motivate staff, "Mr. Toshiro recalls, "and our chances of clinching the deal would be much stronger than if we simply showed them a standard brochure. If we printed the plans in colour, our odds would be better still."

The production of detailed service proposals matching specific customer needs touched off a revolution in sales strategy and galvanized sales staff. The hotel hired new staff for its "information processing team," creating a framework for rapid customer response. In the past, if a sales person made sudden demands such as "we want it tomorrow," the rep could do nothing but refuse, pleading lack of preparation time. Today, sales staff can quickly capitalise on such valuable opportunities.

As Mr. Toshiro confirms, "The CF2001 is a formidable weapon in our sales arsenal. We can produce colour plans quickly, boosting sales effectiveness, making sales reps more proactive and differentiating Koubaitei from the competition."

Koubaitei uses the CF2001 as a network printer, linked by a LAN to 15 PCs throughout the hotel. A team of four staff members, headed by Mr. Toshiro, uses DTP software to design and produce brochures, plans and other publications.

Every month Koubaitei performs DTP editing of five or six plan brochures. "Each customer requires a separate plan, with print runs of only five copies at the most," Mr. Toshiro explains. "We can't send jobs like this to a print shop, so we do the editing on a PC and print the documents on the CF2001."

With the arrival of the busy season, the hotel experiences a sudden spike in demand for its standard brochures (which it orders from a print shop). At times like this, ordering a larger print run is out of the question, as delivery takes too long. So Koubaitei uses the CF2001 to turn out the required additional brochures. Mr. Toshiro says the CF2001 has changed the hotel's perspective on colour dramatically.

Mr. Toshiro stresses the unit's flexibility and ease of use. "When we started talking about bringing in a colour copier, we looked at it from every angle, especially cost. Most people agreed that Koubaitei needed colour output now. The sales staff liked the idea of colour plans. Moreover, doing our tiny print runs on a colour copier/printer would be faster and more cost-effective than sending the jobs to a print shop, so the cost and time-savings were compelling. Today we use the CF2001 mainly for documents we show to customers, rather than for internal clerical functions. It's a sales tool, first and foremost."

Now that we can put colour in documents so easily, our staff are constantly coming to me with new ideas. Before we had the CF2001, nobody had a single idea about colour documents," recalls Mr. Toshiro.

Adding photos to documents is much easier now, too. These used to be input using a flatbed scanner. Today, because the CF2001 can scan documents as large as A3 size with resolution up to 600dpi, scanning is surprisingly fast, boosting work efficiency. "Even as a scanner, the CF2001 is incredible," enthuses Mr. Toshiro.

Koubaitei uses the CF2001 to print coupons for use within the hotel. When these were produced using an inkjet printer, the coupons languished unused in guests' pockets and purses. Now turned out in eye-catching colour, the coupons are exchanged much more often.

Last year the hotel began presenting guests with complimentary, custom-printed hand-fans. Koubaitei simply purchased sets of spines and seals for making fans, applied colour-printed seals to each fan, and voila! An original gift from the hotel for each guest. The back of each fan bore a panoramic view of the hotel as well as the date of the guests' stay. It also featured the travel agency's name and telephone number, which made it more memorable. These unique gifts prove to be highly popular with hotel guests.

In the future, the hotel plans to use digital cameras to produce fans that are personalised for each individual guest, as a keepsake of their visit. "We're coming up with all kinds of ideas," beams Mr. Toshiro excitedly.

Colour has added significant value for Kotohira Grand Hotel. With the business opportunities colour outputting has opened up, this hotel chain in the heart of Shikoku looks set for a rosy future.