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October, 2018

“October knew, of course, that the action of turning a page, of ending a chapter or shutting a book, did not end the tale.”

Neil Gaiman

L,BBG and Orion Go Live Meet the Project Team

Following the go-live of Octopus in late Tracey Robins August, Little, Brown Book Group and Operations Support Orion Publishing Group went live with st 27 Project Eden on 1 October. Manager

All Little, Brown and Orion titles are now Tracey is the longest represented at the Hely Hutchinson serving member of staff Centre and customer orders are being currently at the Hely Hutchinson Centre, fulfilled from the site. The transfer of having worked with the group for 30 remaining stock from LBS will be years. She started in the returns complete by mid-November. All Octopus department at Bookpoint before running stock has now successfully migrated to the their process control department, where new warehouse. she oversaw goods in, value added services and bulk storage planning. The take-on of the extra divisions has seen a huge increase in volume and complexity and there are now more than 5 million Patrycja Prismall & units in stock. Order fulfilment has risen Fiona Clegg from around 8,000 units to more than 50,000 units in a typical day. Operations Support Hachette UK CEO David Shelley visited Administrators Dedicated staff are on site at Carmelite the warehouse on 1st October to oversee House and the Hely Hutchinson Centre to the transition. He is pictured above with Patrycja also previously worked at provide early support to users. Any issues Jo Westbrook (HUK Distribution COO), Bookpoint and now acts as the liaison are being assessed swiftly and those most Matt Wright (HUK Distribution CEO) and point with printers and drivers, checking business critical addressed as a priority. Chris Emerson (Hachette UK COO). appointments and ensuring that deliveries match the goods expected each day.

Fiona joined at the start of October and Next Phase Update Operations Support provides general assistance to the team.

The next phase of the project will cover the A small team has been established at the third party client publishers currently Hely Hutchinson Centre to support the distributed by LBS. delivery and despatch of stock into and Customer Engagement from the warehouse. Planning is already underway and the 12 Ray Webb will attend the Frankfurt Book publishers will be covered in two waves, to Their duties include liaison with drivers, Fair on 10th & 11th October to represent the go live in January and February 2019. taking bookings for goods in deliveries, project and answer any processing manifests for all stock that queries from customers Project team engagement with the comes into the building as well as and interested parties. publishers will increase shortly as they scheduling the release of all new titles. prepare for the migration of their data and business adoption of the new systems. See the ‘Meet the Project Team’ section above for an introduction to the team. The publishers involved are Abrams & Hi, Robot Chronicle, Barefoot Books, Grub Street, Laurence King, Michael O’Mara, Pitch We have employed Publishing, Private Eye, Quarto, Racing the use of ‘robo- Post, Taschen and Thames & Hudson. wrappers’ at the Hely Summersdale, a third party client who are Hutchinson Centre. now part of Octopus Publishing Group, These are robots that will also be covered in this phase. can circle a pallet of books to tightly A schedule for when each publisher will go secure them with re- live will be confirmed later in October. cycled plastic sheeting.