Thomas Kern
Herby Tessadri
The crossbase PIM, MAM and cross-media solution in use at Schellenberg
Siegen, 18/12/2012: Alfred Schellenberg GmbH is a mid-sized family-owned company based in Siegen which is growing at a healthy rate. With an innovative range of windows, doors and gates for DIY enthusiasts, Schellenberg enjoys a leading market position. Its customers include well-known building supply centers, hardware stores, mail-order businesses and e-commerce firms.
In order to automate print publications (dealer program, brochures for end users etc.) and its shop (OXID), Schellenberg opted for the PIM, MAM and cross-media solution from crossbase. Automatically produced media include various print publications and the provision of data for the shop.
Central functions of the solution
Initial data import and data maintenance
The solution is built on the transfer of data from an existing PIM system. All sales items with product features, images and texts were imported into the PIM system via this connection. New products are created manually in the PIM system and then enhanced with product features, product relationships, images, documents and text and depicted in the various product views for different markets and media.
Automated text workflow based on text modules
The highlight is text management with bullet points managed granularly, linked specifically to products and multi-lingual complete texts generated automatically using text templates which are used for print and shop. See image below.
Automation of print production and translation
The publications include dealer programs, brochures for end users, product data sheets, packaging and assembly instructions, which are regularly updated in product group-specific variants. These publications are produced automatically using crossbase and Adobe InDesign. The print automation function allows the layout to be modified subsequently to change the position and detail of images. The layout changes from Adobe InDesign can be saved back to crossbase and used for the next updates or language changes. In the future, the country variants will be expanded systematically; around 25 languages are planned.
