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Every year, Creative Resource hosts Two+Two, an exciting initiative that brings together over 200 marketing and creative students to work with leading industry mentors on a live brief. The students gain an invaluable experience and when the hard work is over, the judges pick a winning team.

The 2023 event was all about sustainability. The brief from this year’s client, Stockport Council’s Climate Action Now (CAN) team, asked for ideas on transforming Stockport into a carbon-neutral town by 2038. Students were also asked to design their campaign to influence how the public feel about climate change. The winning team then pitched their idea to the Stockport CAN Team, with the chance of turning it into reality.

For the last two years, APS have been the creative partner for the event, supplying complimentary design work and printing. We also send two of our agency creatives to help mentor the students and a photographer to capture the day in images, and APS Creative Director Paul Dunleavy sits on the judging panel.

APS also supplied the prize this time, consisting of a visit to our Head Office, where the winning team spent the day with our creatives and account managers developing their idea and pitching skills. We then provided the winning team with ongoing support ahead of the delivery of their finalised idea to Stockport CAN.

The Two+Two event has a fantastic positive impact on marketing, creative and student communities, bridging the gap between the academic world and the industry. APS Group are incredibly proud to support and inspire the next generation of industry professionals every year!

“Two+Two is a free, inclusive event for students across the north of England and it is only possible to deliver it at scale with a lot of assistance. APS helps us in so many ways, not only in the services they provide to us free of charge, but by sending mentors from their teams to help the students on the day and in their support, encouragement and advice, before and after the event. They have our heartfelt thanks.”

Julie Ollerton, Two+Two founder and Managing Director of Creative Resource.

APS Group launch Business Continuity Service to support critical customer communications

APS Group have developed and launched a business continuity service for companies and service providers looking for a trusted partner to support their organisation in the event of unforeseen circumstances, making sure that business-critical documents continue to reach their customers.

The goal here for APS was creating a simple end-to-end business continuity service to streamline the handling of difficult, unforeseen situations. This goes beyond printing and enclosing digital output securely and at scale, and covers design, artworking, document composition, pre-processing, pre-printed documents, insert printing, warehousing and logistics, to name but a few of the critical services that can comprise the whole process. The service APS provide removes unnecessarily complex supply-chain issues and operational management in times of organisational stress.

APS has two state-of-the-art facilities. The first is a ‘warm standby site’, dedicated solely to digital print and enclosing, and is equipped with high-speed full-colour digital presses, cut-sheet printers, high-speed enclosing lines, a variety of finishing equipment and extensive warehousing. The other facility is within a 30 minute-drive and encompasses everything from warehousing and logistics through to high-volume full-colour digital print and enclosing. With over 100,000 sq. ft of production space and warehousing and significant recent investment, the site features new high-speed full colour digital presses, ultra-high-speed envelope inserting with inkjet addressing capability and a purpose built ‘smart factory’ for high-security, complex, lower volume jobs.

Our sites hold the expected accreditations for cyber, data management, production and despatch, and our customers can always rely on APS to manage sensitive data professionally.

Steve Goodall, Group Operations Director at APS explains, “With both of our facilities located close to Manchester Airport and all the main motorway hubs, we have excellent accessibility from almost anywhere in the UK. Our modern facilities are all purpose-designed and built for efficiency, making sure that our clients are assured they are in safe hands. Alongside these facilities, we have Lean Six Sigma teams across all our capabilities who will support and look after our customers every step of the way, and in times of difficulty, we will do all we can to reduce the stress.”

Let’s make more possible.

Two+Two Creative Resource

APS Group launch Business Continuity Service to support critical customer communications