Print Management

While large businesses are taking every step possible to reduce printing by a small fraction, small businesses are having a much easier time making the switch to green printing techniques. Small businesses and home offices don’t have to worry about extended print monitoring periods and extensive reductions, as they simply don’t print the high volume that large corporations do.

Small businesses can implement any of the following green printing tips and notice a significant reduction in the amount of paper and supplies they go through annually.

Most organizations underestimate the total cost of print production by as much as 50%. According to a recent Gartner Group study, organizations can spend as much as 3% of their total annual revenue on document output. Very often, those organizations will find that the majority of the output is from laser printers. Those costs range from toner and parts to service labor and network management. The real challenge is that most organizations do not understand how to measure or manage these costs. Without measurable controls in place to control these costs, positively affecting the bottom line is nearly impossible.

Managed print services, often referred to as print management or MPS, is a service that provides organizations with cost containment tools and strategies for print output. Gary Halperin, former CFO for IKON Office Solutions and Print, Inc. points out that, “MPS is a method for a customer to have their entire environment surrounding the management of output devices handled by one vendor [usually] under one agreement.” Managed print services provide certain service components for the end-user. Halperin continues by saying that end-users benefit by “right sizing their fleet of print devices in the right environments including networking, parts, service and all consumables.”

It is no doubt that documents are truly the key vehicle by which information flows through any organization. Documents, whether electronic or paper-based, are critical to an organization’s operation. Printing and reproducing those documents can be a very costly endeavor.

A recent InfoTrends market research study indicates that the output costs for printers and multi-function systems in an average company account for about 2% of that company’s annual revenue. If that same company takes into consideration all printing related costs such walking to the printer, finishing or delivering the printed document and storing the printed document, a company can spend as much as 6% of its annual revenue. To put that into perspective, a $10 million company can spend as much as $600,000 per year managing printing and print related processes.

Even though an average of 2% of annual revenues are consumed with office printing, most companies have no idea how much they are spending to operate their fleet of laser printers. Most costs associated with printing go unaudited and most organizations spend far more in print reproduction than they realize.

Print reproduction is expensive. In fact, it might be more expensive than you realize. There are three keys areas of cost in print reproduction. They are toner and supplies, maintenance and inefficiencies in printer usage.

The most understood cost associated with print reproduction is that of toner and supplies. We all understand that it takes toner, paper and perhaps drums to print a document. Interestingly enough, even though most people understand this cost, most people don’t know the true cost. For example, an inkjet cartridge may only cost $30, but if it only yields a total of 500 prints (regardless what the package may say) that cost is $.06 per print… just for ink. You might be surprised how much you are actually spending in just toner and supplies. The device you thought was not costing your organization very much may in fact be very expensive.

The consolidation of equipment in your office is a positive step towards increasing office efficiency. However, if you do not properly consolidate equipment and don’t take into account the overall need and deployment of equipment throughout your office, it is easy to actually hinder the productivity of your employees. The top problems that businesses have in regards to the deployment and consolidation of their equipment include:

• Utilizing too many devices, driving up supply costs.
• Consolidating equipment down to too few devices. This causes bottlenecks and does not allow your employees to work at maximum productivity.
• Not giving your employees the right tools to do the job, such as implementing black and white copiers when they need the ability to copy in color.
• Improperly deploying equipment that sets too many machines outside of the normal work area. Proper deployment means optimizing your office so that the maximum number of users have access to your copiers and printers without causing bottlenecks and leaving users in other parts of the office without equipment.

Most organizations underestimate the total cost of print production by as much as 50%. According to a recent Gartner Group study, organizations can spend as much as 3% of their total annual revenue on document output. Very often, those organizations will find that the majority of the output is from laser printers. Those costs range from toner and parts to service labor and network management. The real challenge is that most organizations do not understand how to measure or manage these costs. Without measurable controls in place to control these costs, positively affecting the bottom line is nearly impossible.

Managed print services, often referred to as print management or MPS, is a service that provides organizations with cost containment tools and strategies for print output. Gary Halperin, former CFO for IKON Office Solutions and Print, Inc. points out that, “MPS is a method for a customer to have their entire environment surrounding the management of output devices handled by one vendor [usually] under one agreement.” Managed print services provide certain service components for the end-user. Halperin continues by saying that end-users benefit by “right sizing their fleet of print devices in the right environments including networking, parts, service and all consumables.”

Over the last 10 years, many new tools have come to market that offer advantages to both office equipment dealers and their customers. Office equipment dealers have worked diligently to collect and manage the data from collection tools developed by companies such as Print Fleet, PrintAudit and FMAudit. Without these key technologies, management of these various print devices would be a very manual process and it would be difficult to realize cost benefits of effectively managing print devices on the network. With tools such as FMAudit’s Local Agent, even non-networked devices can be effectively managed remotely.

 When you are in the market for a new printing device, there are many things to consider before making a purchase decision. There are many options out there for different types of printers with various quality, speeds and functions. It is important to know what you are signing you and your employees up for when purchasing office equipment.

Some of the main things that would-be purchasers typically consider first are cost, quality, function and speed. While these features are indeed important, there are a few other considerations that are often overlooked. Many times, if low cost is a high priority for the new equipment, the following elements can be ignored in order to secure that important low initial cost.

While both print and document management services can lead to savings within your office, combining the two services will maximize savings, waste reduction and productivity. These simple steps can lead to many new productivity-enhancing methods within your business as well. Simply enhancing the productivity of your employees will increase the quality of work and the quantity of work that is completed, meaning that you have higher savings that are not reflected directly by your annual budget.

Print Management

Your print management program is the key to reducing waste and saving from your annual printing budget. While many companies spend upwards of 3% of their annual budget on printing, your business does not have to be caught in the trap of unnecessary printing. From your print audit to the implementation of your print reduction plan, your office will be able to optimize the way that you approach printing.

 With businesses trying to keep up with the day-to-day and striving to grow in the future, sometimes it can be easy to overlook the current state of a company’s current processes. This principle is especially true when it comes to understanding current printing practices. Many wasteful printing habits are employed throughout all industries without the company even realizing it.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Print management services will help a company assess their current printing practices and work to reduce printing waste. Printing waste can be paper, ink, toner, electricity and ultimately, money. The wasting of any of these resources ends up being extra money spent that could have been better invested.