Josie’s Pre-Interview Company Research

Target Company:

Getty Images-Lexington

What I know:

One location of an international online stock photography and footage provider. Second largest stock imagery house. Main competitor: Corbis. Lexington location is data management only; sales and customer service are handled in New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. They have another data management location somewhere in Florida and probably at least one or two locations in other countries.

Basic Business Facts

How big?
Very big company.
13 locations total.
9,000 employees; 130 at Lexington.
Revenues of $28 million last year.

Purpose
Getty is a for-profit company that sells royalty-free and rights-managed photography and footage to news organizations, companies and individuals.

History
They have been around since 1965. Their online business model was launched in 1999. Originally founded by the Getty family. Now a public company run by board-elected senior management.

Employee Information
Based on the published employee bios, it looks like many people have been with Getty for over 5 years, a few have been there longer than 10.

For the data management employees it looks like most of them have extremely solid technical and computer science backgrounds, along with a high degree of fluency in database design and management.

Position Information
It looks like there are 10 Digital Asset Assistant positions. The next level up is Digital Asset Associates (10); then Digital Asset Managers (3); then Digital Asset Vice Director (1) and Director (1).

QUESTION: How does the work get divided among the assistants? Does each assistant work with a single Associate?

Market Research

According to the annual report I found on the Getty site, the company’s performance between 2000-2007 was stellar. 2007-2009 was flat or declining. It looks like they are coming back from the recession like everyone else. In general, the financial picture looks strong at this point.

The market, particularly with royalty-free imagery, is expanding rapidly.

Getty sells all of their products online. They have an extensive retail and customer service team that supports the online outlet and a massive web design and data team that keeps everything moving and updated.

Getty has been selling stock imagery since its inception and has changed and adjusted to trends, advances, and demand by staying current with its artists and journalists and also keeping up with technology in terms of retail and delivery of their product.

The company has a 30% domestic market share and is a major player worldwide. Their main US competitor is Corbis Imagery who holds 38% percent.

Competition

Corbis Imagery is really the only serious competitor. Corbis is known for a more corporate, less artistic product. Getty and Corbis are in direct and close competition when it comes to current event imagery sales.

Corbis is also an old company with a massive and successful online retail business structure. Corbis is in good financial shape and their business took the same hit during the recession.

Work Structure

The data management division operates 24 hours a day in order to provide on the minute imagery for newspapers and online news outlets. It looks like their asset management teams run in three shifts: 7-3; 3-11; 11-7.

It looks like the employees are happy but also have a lot of work. The time pressure seems enormous and never ending.

QUESTION: what structures are in place to provide support when a massive news event happens or some other circumstance arises where deadlines are tight and the workload is huge?