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PRESS RELEASE: Kodak Brings Leadership and Innovation to Photo Kiosk Category
Company Launches Modular "Self-Assist" Kodak Picture Maker Solutions to Grow Digital Consumer Offerings, Capture Profit Potential
COLOGNE, Germany, September 24 -- Eastman Kodak Company launched today at photokina an expanded family of Kodak Picture Maker solutions that will offer increased retail photo services for consumers, as well as drive in-store digital printing revenue for retailers.
Kodak has reinvented its kiosk family with a simplified, modular approach that provides the flexibility retailers need to scale according to volume, grow high-margin consumer photo offerings and connect these photo offerings to a variety of imaging equipment through a common hardware and software platform. Driven by a consistent consumer interface, the Picture Maker family includes three modular stations: the Picture Maker Order Station, Picture Maker Digital Station and Picture Maker Print Station.
The new Picture Maker family builds upon Picture Maker's continued success, providing consumers with more imaging options and more access points to the world of Kodak picture services. Attractive to digital camera users, people in search of gift ideas and those who want to be more creative with their pictures, each station in the Picture Maker family enables a wide range of new consumer applications.
"Retailers have a tremendous opportunity with the new Picture Maker family to offer consumers an expanded range of do-it-yourself picture solutions that will continue to drive repeat traffic to the retail environment and generate profit," said David K. Jones, Worldwide Product Line manager, Kiosks and Consumer Imaging, Kodak. "With this announcement, Kodak is expanding the market reach of Picture Maker and widening the placement potential for the Picture Maker family - now anywhere people want access to Kodak Picture services."
The new Picture Maker family represents a significant shift in Kodak's approach to picture kiosks as the Picture Maker software platform will be enhanced by the Kodak Image Access Standard, an open architecture that enables connectivity to 3rd party developed equipment, websites and applications and in-store fulfillment; providing retailers with greater choice in the products and services they can offer to their consumers.
The Expanded Picture Maker Family
Kodak invented the photo kiosk category in 1994 with the launch of its Picture Maker kiosk. Since that time, Kodak has placed more than 35,000 Picture Maker kiosks worldwide with over 22,000 in the United States and Canada and 6,000 in Europe, Africa and the Middle East region and has grown print volume to record levels behind strong advertising and marketing campaigns. Kodak is now leveraging its photo kiosk expertise and strong Picture Maker brand recognition to expand its portfolio, meet new channel needs, and drive new consumer applications.
The expanded Picture Maker family starts with the Order Station, which enables consumers to preview and select their analog or digital images and print them to a retailer's on-site digital lab system. If a retailer wants the ability to have their customer print digital images in just minutes, they can upgrade their Order Station to a Digital Station by adding a 4x6 printer. If their customer has a need to scan and print images up to 8x10, a retailer can upgrade to a fully featured Print Station by adding a flatbed scanner and Kodak 8110 printer. Each of these products in the Picture Maker family can be purchased individually, or a retailer can upgrade from one to the next as their business needs change.
Kodak Picture Maker Order Station
The Kodak Picture Maker Order Station is the next generation of Kodak's current Preview and Select service. For the consumer, it opens up a variety of imaging choices, giving them the opportunity to preview and select their analog or digital images and have them fulfilled onsite through the retailer's digital lab. The Order Station writes to a CD and features a touch-screen monitor that allows users to view thumbnails of their pictures, zoom and crop, reduce red-eye and adjust brightness.
Kodak Picture Maker Digital Station
With a speed of 25-seconds per print, the Kodak Picture Maker Digital Station will allow consumers to print from digital memory cards, CDs, or floppy disks with JPEG images - faster than ever before. Consumers can simply walk up to this kiosk and insert their memory cards, CD or floppy disk, and gain access to a touch-screen monitor with an intuitive user interface. It accepts the most common memory card formats, including CompactFlash, Smart Media cards, Memory Stick, MMC and Secure Digital. The Picture Maker Digital Station allows consumers to zoom/crop, eliminate red-eye, adjust colors and print photo-quality 4x6 thermal prints onto top quality Kodak paper. It also allows consumers to write images to a Kodak Picture CD. When the consumer is finished, they will soon have the option to pay for the entire transaction by credit card.
Kodak Picture Maker Station
As the full service member of the Picture Maker family, the Print Station brings all the functionality of the Order Station and Digital Station to the original Picture Maker. Offering reprints and enlargements up to 8x10 from original prints (without the need for negatives), consumers can make great pictures from almost any source even better in just 5 minutes. And consumers can print these pictures to a wide variety of digital printers, enabling high-volume and unique format printing in-store.
The Picture Maker Print Station accepts original prints, CD, floppy or digital media and offers popular edit and enhancement features. Its newly enhanced digital media printing capability makes it easier and faster than ever before to print digital camera images or write them to a Kodak Picture CD. It will also enable consumers to preview and select their favorite digital images, and print them at the kiosk or at the retailer's digital lab.
A Future Vision
"As the picture kiosk category grows, we see it transitioning into a much broader category that we like to call APM or Automated Picture Machines," said Jones.
This solution is modeled from a popular concept in the United States banking industry that is called Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), which in Europe are cash point machines. Basically, these stand-alone machines are located anywhere a consumer needs to get cash quickly - the grocery store, an amusement park, near office complexes. This concept is launching in an effort to make photography as convenient as possible for the consumer. As a result, the number of APMs for photos may one day rival those of cash point machines for banking.
The introduction of the APM category represents an important development in Kodak's approach to picture kiosks as it explores various venues to bring Picture Makers to where consumers take their pictures. These include venues where the consumer is now purchasing digital cameras, film and photography accessories, as well as non-traditional photo channels, such as hotels, airports and other high-traffic picture-taking venues.
"There are dozens of tests taking place around the world in new and traditional channels to determine consumer response to printing digital camera pictures from kiosks. This research will allow us to develop products and services to meet consumer demands round the world and help us drive future growth," said Jones.
Benefits to the Retailer
This expanded range of do-it-yourself printing options allows consumers to print more conveniently than ever before - in minutes, hours or overnight - and to print at these retail stations from digital memory cards, CD's and prints. These self-service modular stations offer increased reliability and photo quality and are flexible - countertop or stand-alone - for the retailer.
"Picture Makers provide consumers with the ability to quickly and easily print photos wherever they are," said Jones. "In many respects Picture Maker is the easiest way for a consumer to print digital camera pictures at retail, supporting our strategy to make digital printing easier and increase the number of pictures printed."
For retailers the benefits of the expanded Picture Maker family are clear: - Strong brand name.
- Significant marketing investment to drive consumer demand.
- Software designed to meet the changing needs of today's consumer.
- Solutions that can grow with a retailer's business needs.
- Connectivity to on-site products and services.
- Ongoing worldwide service and support through a three-tiered system that includes unit replacement, an 800-number service help desk.
Eastman Kodak Company and Infoimaging
Kodak is the leader in helping people take, share, enhance, preserve, print and enjoy pictures -- for memories, for information, for entertainment. The company is a major participant in "infoimaging" -- a $385 billion industry composed of devices (digital cameras and PDAs), infrastructure (online networks and delivery systems for images) and services & media (software, film and paper enabling people to access, analyze and print images). Kodak harnesses its technology, market reach and a host of industry partnerships to provide innovative products and services for customers who need the information-rich content that images contain, such as Kodak Picture Maker . The company, with sales last year of $13.2 billion, is organized into four major businesses: Photography, providing consumers, professionals and cinematographers with digital and traditional products and services; Commercial Imaging, offering image capture, output and storage products and services to businesses and government; Components, delivering flat-panel displays, optics and sensors to original equipment manufacturers; and Health, supplying the healthcare industry with traditional and digital image capture and output products and services.
Kodak is a trademark of Eastman Kodak Company.
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