Speedy printing goes hand in hand with fastest bowling

Dec. 11, 2012 - PRLog -- With its first ever game in 1833, Twickenham Cricket Club (http://www.twickenhamcc.net/) in South London is one of the world’s oldest cricket venues. Despite its well-deserved reputation, like most sports clubs Twickenham CC is self-funding and relies on a variety of events to support itself. When club secretary Dan Hough needed a new ticket printer for a fundraising race night, he approached a number of manufacturers but soon discovered that the thermal printing solutions provided by Citizen Systems Europe (http://www.citizen-europe.com/index.asp) could not only cover his printing requirements but greatly increase revenues too.

Dan commented, “We work on a three tier structure for raising funds for any event; sponsorship, attendance and participation. Originally we were just interested in a ticket printer to record attendance but looking further into the innovative solutions Citizen Systems Europe could offer us we found additional revenue opportunities in both sponsorship and participation”.

At their most basic event tickets not only need to provide the all essential information, but are also a venue’s shop window.  Club Captain Paul Johnson noted, “We need quality tickets with quality printing to portray a quality event. We originally thought this meant an expensive printer but thanks to the Citizen CL-S400DT (http://www.citizen-europe.com/printer/barcode/cls400/inde...) we could produce excellent tickets at a fraction of the cost of other suppliers. Their equipment was extremely easy to use too and I usually think of ticket printing as an evening’s work – now it’s just a matter of minutes”.

As in-house preparations for the event were taking place, it was Dan Hough’s job to arrange sponsors: “Citizen recommended that betting slips were printed on the Citizen CT-S851 (http://www.citizen-europe.com/printer/mini-pos/cts800-600...) printer because it is the world’s only POS printer with an LCD display. This enabled us to put the sponsor’s name in front of each punter, each time they placed a bet. Better still, contact details such as a phone number or website could also be displayed. This made attracting sponsors much easier than it has been in the past when we could only offer a verbal announcement”.

Paul Johnson was surprised by the speed of the CT-S851 printer. “We normally use pre-printed betting slips which are a further cost, but the speed of CT-S851 is the quickest I have seen.” He continued, “This meant we were able to print individual slips for each punter. We could also increase the size of the betting slip to 15cm, which gave us space to give each sponsor additional exposure for their race, and printing each slip in half a second kept queues short! By choosing the front output printer, we were also able to locate them within the busiest area of our pavilion, like the bar, without fear of a spilt drink damaging the units, something which would have closed down betting”.

Twickenham CC also challenged Citizen to provide a solution which would increase the number of attendees betting on each race, which in previous years had tended to decrease as the night wore on. Citizen suggested an additional POS - only this time, mobile. This requirement was addressed by Citizen’s CMP-30BT (http://www.citizen-europe.com/printer/portable/cmp20-30/i...) printer which was easy to link to a mobile device, resulting in betting slips being printed on demand anywhere within the club. “We have plenty of mobile phones and devices amongst our members, but we were concerned how easy it would be to link them up to a printer. Citizen’s development kit made this child’s play and a simple program was written for an Android mobile phone which meant nobody missed out”, explained Dan Hough. “The benefits of a mobile point of sale were clear in making the event one of the most successful in the club’s 180 year history”.

Citizen Systems Europe
Citizen Systems Europe operates from locations throughout Europe covering the EMEA region. It offers a wide range of printers for industrial, retail, healthcare and mobile applications specialising in label, barcode, portable and point-of-sale printers.  In each case, the company’s products are sold and supported by a network of specialised partners.

Citizen Systems Europe is a wholly owned subsidiary of Citizen Systems Japan and part of the Citizen group of companies, a global organisation that manufactures products ranging from its world-famous Eco-Drive watches, calculators, mini-printers and industrial printing systems to machine tools, quartz oscillators, LEDs and other electronic components.

For further information contact Jörk Schüßler, European Marketing Manager for Citizen System Europe. Citizen Systems Europe, 643 - 651 Staines Road, Feltham, Middlesex, TW14 8PA.  Tel: 020 8893 1900. Fax: 020 8893 0080 (tel:020%208893%200080). Email: joerk.schuessler@citizen-europe.com  Web: www.citizen-europe.com

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