Open for business for just five months, the KODAK Creative Network will close its doors on August 15. Today, an email went out announcing the discontinuation of the service:

Thank you for being such an important part of the KODAK Creative Network service. Your participation has enabled us to learn a great deal about our customers' wants and needs.

Based on the valuable feedback from our members, KODAK will be providing a single integrated service for all our consumer online printing products and services. On August 15, 2007, the KODAK Creative Network will officially close. In the future, we will add products of the type sold through the KODAK Creative Network to the product portfolio at the KODAK Gallery.

Although the current service at creative.kodak.com will officially end, current members may continue to use the service and place orders through August 15, 2007. If you are going to need additional materials, you should place an order before this date.

Thank you again for your participation.

The Team
KODAK Creative Network

Launched March 13 the KODAK Creative Network was positioned as an online design and printing service for the small office/home office market. The next week, March 19, Jeff Hayzlett , Chief Marketing Officer and Vice President, KODAK Graphic Communications Group, clarified KODAK's strategy in an interview with Cary Sherburne. While the service had been launched by the Digital Imaging Service as opposed to the Graphic Communications Group, Hayzlett offered some clarification.

"KODAK Creative Network is in response to requests from our customers to drive more demand for print business. Production for the KODAK Creative Network, KODAK EASYSHARE Gallery and other independent online services is done by KODAK customers utilizing KODAK NEXPRESS solutions. Our customers are asking for more business, and we're doing everything we can to get more of it to them."

A test run and a post on PrintCEO Blog drew a number of comments. In the Blog post was yet another clarification from Mr. Hayzlett.

No, KODAK isn't getting into the printing business; yes, KODAK is getting into networking printing businesses. "We are looking for printers with Nexpress devices to create a production network," Jeff told me. "Our goal is to send more business into those workflows. We expect to have dozens of printers who will produce the items from the Creative Network on KODAK equipment."

This is a test, only a test

While much was made of using the service to aggregate demand for printers with NexPress equipment, it appears that this particular network is not the direction KODAK is heading.

No major marketing of the service had been done; it was a "soft launch" of the new service. The site had been live for about 8 months in a "test mode." And there were advertising tests, direct mail tests, and e-mail tests that took place to judge the response of small office/home office businesses. The model KODAK followed was the rollout of the EasyShare Gallery; logical since the same group was launching the new network.

"We always said this was a test facility and we're done with the test," said Jeff. "The Creative Network was part of our learning process. We wanted to know how printers are selling print. What works and what doesn't work." According to Hayzlett, KODAK will be incorporating technology developed for the Creative Network site into the KODAK Gallery site and into the KODAK Insite Storefront application."