Pharmaceutical Print Production:
How to Structure It for Success

By Guest Contributor, Ray Kunzmann

There's not much that makes pharma (as in pharmaceutical) printing unique compared to print for other industries, except for prescribing information, which is usually produced by the packaging groups. There are a lot of considerations for design due to regulatory requirements but not so for print. However, I do have a philosophy about how the management of print for pharma should be structured and purchased. Here are some thoughts.

What makes managing print production for pharmaceutical marketing unique is the opportunity provided by the fact that pharma print can be boring. Buyers and printers working for cosmetics and car companies are obsessed with obtaining critical color and executing various production techniques. Buyers for pharmaceutical companies generally focus on keeping projects on schedule and securing the print buy.

As far as critical color goes, pharmaceutical print is largely about flesh tones and logos where "pleasing" color is sufficient as long as the logos match well from spread to spread. But before that, saving money is probably the most critical issue. From a project management and purchasing standpoint, pharma companies have the opportunity to apply focus to different areas simultaneously. That's where I believe the issue resides: in the decision regarding the structure of the print buying group.

Many pharmaceutical companies, just like a lot of companies, have procurement- or purchasing-based buying groups that concern themselves with managing the workflow of the buying process rather than addressing the print purchase and the costs associated with the creative development process. Almost exclusively, the development process and the costs associated with it are managed completely by agencies of record. Rarely do agencies purchase art development, external retouching, etc., at any rate of discount passed on to the client. If they perform those services internally, it is run as a profit center and not a service. Most pharma brand managers don't have any idea what savings they're missing.

A Production Management Department with a centralized pre-press operation makes for a better design. Under this structure, the department is staffed with print knowledgeable managers who can save money better than purchasing people since they know where to look for savings opportunities. Additional savings is realized in centralizing pre-press with one of your print partners or a pre-press supplier. A global pre-press supplier allows international offices access to images, services and savings. Computer-generated art, retouching, digital photography, image re-purposing, small design, asset management and more, all at discounted pricing are what's available under this design.

The best part? It's the control that's at the fingertips of the production manager. With this structure in place, the manager has a direct feed to the project development process where he or she can affect decisions involving time-sensitive issues that usually drive up agency costs and slow down schedules. Having more control of the overall development schedule makes it easier to get final specifications faster, which allows printers to be involved earlier in the process if necessary, before disk release lessening threats to delivery schedules that often require overtime charges.

A lot of pharma companies have production departments that they consider effective, and for what they're responsible for, they probably are. But not understanding the entire opportunity or worse, ignoring it, is just plain inefficient with regard to project control and cost savings/cost avoidance.