Home » About » Case Studies » Secondwind
HubCast offers a failsafe system with clear policies for quality control.
Second Wind, Inc. is a leading provider of wind measurement systems for the wind energy industry. The company’s marketing department has embraced online marketing and social networking tools to extend its reach. But face-to-face meetings at events and company-sponsored workshops still provide vital opportunities for Second Wind’s sales force to generate high-quality, targeted leads. A critical component of each event is the print collateral prospects take back to their offices as reference tools.
Second Wind places a high value on environmentally sustainable business practices. So as it looked to reduce its carbon footprint, the company also looked for an online solution to reduce shipping costs. Second Wind’s search for an online solution offering all the quality and service of a local printer led it to HubCast’s Cloud Print Service.
With HubCast, Second Wind has gained:
Second Wind has been a leading supplier of electronics and software to the wind energy industry for 30 years. Its mission is to advance the use of wind data to make wind energy profitable, easy-to-use, and practical. Based in Somerville, Massachusetts, Second Wind is a small company with a global reach; its ground-breaking products are in use in over 40 countries, on all seven continents, around the world.
Recognized throughout the industry for technological innovation and excellent customer support, Second Wind was on Inc. Magazine’s list of the fastest-growing private companies in the United States for three consecutive years. The company has seven direct sales representatives in North America and London along with resellers in Europe and Asia. Its customers include wind project developers, utilities, engineering companies, and wind industry service providers.
Second Wind creates all its marketing and sales tools in-house. Until recently, the company printed locally near its headquarters, and shipped materials to events, seminars, and sales offices around the world as needed. “Like everyone else, sometimes we’d use the office printer for projects where the quality wasn’t critical,” says Naomi Pierce, marketing associate. The company also tried online printers for smaller, on-demand projects. But neither solution provided Second Wind with the professional-quality print materials it needed. “The price was lower, but I found the quality of the online printers we tried was very uneven,” says Pierce. “Plus, many online printers print in a central location and then ship finished materials to customers, so they didn’t reduce our carbon footprint or our shipping costs.”
Pierce also had worked closely with the company’s local printer for many years and was hoping to find an affordable alternative that combined the security of a local relationship with the convenience and geographic reach of an online printer. “I worked with our local printer for many years; they had our files, their work was really high-quality and they had gone above and beyond for me on many occasions. But we still had to ship all our materials; they couldn’t meet the challenge of reducing our carbon footprint,” says Pierce.
“HubCast is the ideal mix of online convenience and personal support,” explains Pierce. “Plus it supports our goal of reducing our carbon footprint. I do everything online; but if I need help, HubCast’s customer service is super responsive. HubCast is very different from other online vendors; with HubCast I feel I have a trusted partner. That to me really makes the difference.”
Pierce, a graphic designer, is impressed with HubCast’s pre-press focus on preparing .pdfs properly. “HubCast offers a failsafe system with clear policies for quality control. They work with me on the front end to ensure the .pdf is exact before it’s sent to the printer, so when the job goes on press, there are no mistakes. I also appreciate the automatic preflight and error correction that happens when I submit a file. That saves me a lot of time.” ”
I found HubCast’s premium quality, combined with its ease-of-use, price, and the fact that it’s a green solution very attractive,” said Pierce. “We’re getting professional quality sales tools with HubCast for about the same price it cost to print on the office printer.”
“With HubCast we’re doing things the right way. We get much higher quality and HubCast prints where we will use the materials, so we are not shipping long distances and we are reducing our carbon footprint. HubCast makes sense to me.”
Going forward as we expand our international marketing programs, it will be a huge benefit to have our sales tools printed where they will be delivered,” concludes Pierce. “We like the idea of working with a single vendor and having our materials printed around the world. HubCast is like my local printer gone global.”