The PLC has had an interim finance director since the summer of 2018. Simon Barrell, who held that role, will now step down and become a non-executive director at the business.
Iain Brown, who joined Grafenia last October, has now formally joined the board as group finance director. He was previously group financial controller at software firm Myriad Group.
Gunning thanked Barrell for his work on behalf of the business, and said he was pleased that he would continue to be available to support Brown as a non-exec.
“We’re delighted to welcome Iain to the board of Grafenia. Since joining the business towards the end of last year, he's made further progress in modernising our finance function. We look forward to him leading a finance team, designed for the future needs of the business,” Gunning said.
Gunning’s new 148pp book, Secrets & Chandeliers, has been sent out to all existing Nettl and Printing.com partners, and is also being used as a promotional item – it includes a 30-day free trial offer for the Nettl Method.
The book describes Grafenia’s W3P setup as “the secret system powering the world’s largest design studio network”.
Gunning said he was inspired to write the book after visiting a Nettl studio and overhearing a member of staff handling and finalising a repeat order, with upsell, in under two minutes.
He said it had made him think about how many things had to be in place behind the scenes for that to happen.
“For the first time we’ve decided to pull back the curtain and show what goes on in our Nettl company studios. To reveal the systems still working, even when the chandeliers are turned off for the night,” he stated.
The book is broken down into seven sections: design, websites, production, marketing, sales, finance and support.
A further 7,000 copies have been mailed to prospective Nettl partners, and Gunning said the book was also being offered “free to anyone in the trade” via the firm’s website at www.nettl.com/uk/secrets/.
It’s not the first time a Grafenia boss has produced a book. Former CEO Tony Rafferty wrote a book about web-to-print, Web2Print MD2MD, back in 2014.
