PackshotCreator photo studio is the right tool for Oxylane so the company can create its visuals in-house

Paris, January 26, 2009 – Giving visibility to Décathlon's (Oxylane) Passion brands on their website and in their stores was a major challenge. In order to achieve large amounts of professional photos regularly and at a low cost, Oxylane has a fleet of 5 "PackshotCreator Pro” photo studios at the corporate office. Any employee can take the shot he needs to make product information clear and attractive.

The leader in French sports distribution, via Décathlon, Oxylane also produces a wide range of its own sports equipment. After car manufacturers, it has the largest industrial design structure in France. Sports items must meet rigorous technical specifications. Patrice Nairi, Multimedia Communication Director, within the Concept team, is behind the adoption of the PackshotCreator solution by Décathlon.

In May 2006, he bought a photo studio for the Quechua Mountain product line. The solution was then adopted for the other brands. "We made up the cost of the PackshotCreator photo studio very quickly. It was immediately adopted internally, and has helped to improve the communication of Passion products and to make 25% more photos at zero additional cost. But above all, we could communicate about products which had previously been missing from Décathlon's communication".

Building on a fast growing ROI and on a large potential market, the Concept team led them into a “strong expansion project” and opened doors. In turn, playing the role of tester and then prescriber and finally central purchasing, the team “sold” to the brands a ready to use solution.

The team ensured that the process of taking photos with the PackshotCreator was quickly adapted to the specific constraints of Oxylane's database. The database evolved to include pictures taken with the "PackshotCreator Pro". They are automatically resized and entered into the database, where they are renamed and updated to correspond to the standard house picture.

The Concept team has previously provided a list of categories by type: accessories, shoes, balls… Before, it was a lot of work to reference and integrate the images from the software into the system. The PackshotCreator software is now recognized by the system. New user installation is extremely easy. The link between the PackshotCreator software and the database is instantaneous.

Besides the ability to photograph “difficult” items, the PackshotCreator solution makes product photography easy and quick to achieve. The Décathlon catalogue has several thousand references, which are updated and renewed every spring and fall. In the print or on the web, Décathlon brings particular attention to product communicating.

Internally, the communication to the stores is positively impacted. A number of items are difficult to represent faithfully in photography due to the peculiar size, texture or colors.

To improve the visual communication of these types of items, around fifteen people, including product managers, quickly embraced the photo studios in order to present each brand. They were able to measure the added value of such a photo studio made for non-professionals: increasing the volume of visuals, industrializing, and profiting from taking large numbers of product shots.

Another application due to reliability and accuracy of shots: product quality control or monitoring after sale services.

Press Contact :

Laetitia Carbonel
+33 (0)1 47 42 66 66
lcarbonel@sysnext.fr