Tackling the print less challenge

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Getting you thinking about paper wastage and how to print less

If you stacked the millions of café loyalty cards distributed to Australians flat on top of each of other they’d extend about 2.5 times the height of Sydney Tower.  That’s a lot of cards – especially when you consider most of them will only be used once or end up lost.  It’s the same with office printing.  If you piled up all the documents your employees print each month it’s likely you’d be shocked by just how much is produced.paper Tackling the print less challenge

While the solution for the future of café loyalty may lie with smartphone apps rather
than physical cards, what about printing?  What steps can your business take to ensure employees print less?

The answer to that question is far from black and white.  Afterall, every business is
different.

Simple steps you can take to print less

1.       Audit what you print – If you’re going to have any
success in printing less a good place to start is by first assessing who is
printing what.  Does one department print a lot more than others?
What are they printing?  Is the printing in black and white or colour?
Are there individuals printing excessive amounts of documents?  Once you
know the answers to these questions, devising a print less strategy is much
easier.

2.       Set some policies – A lot of organisations talk the
talk when it comes to printing less but few formalise processes or educate
employees about what’s acceptable and not.  What policies look like will
depend on your business but typical policices include printing everything
double-sided and only using colour printers if absolutely critical.
Enforcing policies by regularly updating employees (especially new ones) is
crucial.

3.       Invest in tech – Sometimes educating employees
about why it’s important for environmental and economic reasons to print less
only gets you so far.  To have any real impact in reducing the amount
that’s printed organisations need to invest in solutions such as swipe and
release innovations that require employees to swipe an identification card
before a job is released from a printer.  Our experience shows
implementing such kit can help businesses shave around 20 per cent off their
annual printing bill.

What do you think?  Have you ever tried any of the steps outlined above to get your business to print less?

Managed Print Services in 2012

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Managed Print Services and New Year’s resolutions

Did you set some New Year’s resolutions for your business this year?  If you did, it’s likely improving efficiencies and reducing costs feature more than once.  Sensible stuff given the economic pressures Australian businesses currently face. But how do you actually stick to your resolutions?

new years resolution Managed Print Services in 2012

For resolutions we set in our personal lives success often hinges on determination and good habits. Business is no different.  If you don’t get into goodhabits from the outset, come July you’re unlikely to have achieved your goals.

And when it comes to reducing the amount you print and the associated costs, signing up to a managed print services contract can really help.

Managed print services good habits

Here’s an example of five habits our customers enjoy with
Upstream managed print services:

  1. Comprehensive audits of printing levels so businesses can act on opportunities to improve efficiencies.  On average we are able to
    save customers 30 per cent on printing costs.
  2. Real-time insight into how much is being printed across a business.  This gives organisations complete visibility
    into who is printing what so they can get a handle on printing levels.
  3. Automatic toner ordering so there’s no need for a business to worry about stocking
    up on vital supplies or order toner manually.
  4. Swipe and release printing solutions that require employees to swipe ID cards before a job is released.  The impact this has on reducing printing levels is often particularly significant.
  5. Ongoing customer account reviews that ensure we’re best addressing the needs and challenges a business faces

If you’re keen to cut costs and improving the efficiency of  your business by getting into good habits you could do a lot worse than getting into managed print services.

Which one of these printing personalities are you?

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Do you look like any of these printing personalities?

which one of these printing personalities are you Which one of these printing personalities are you?

There are many types of printing personalities, and today I’d like to talk about just a few of them.

We all know that reducing your printing is good for the environment and great for the bottom line;  it’s something we’ve talked about on here many times before (for example, in the Think Before You Print article).  We’ve also talked a lot about the range of solutions available to help better manage print levels, paper consumption etc.

What we haven’t talked about in any huge detail (but what’s certainly important) is human behaviour.  If your employees aren’t on board in terms of printing less then solutions and printing audits will only take you so far.  To really make a difference, employees need to buy-in to a printing reduction strategy.

Today I thought I’d have a bit of fun by having a go at identifying some personality types when it comes to office printing.  Do you recognise yourself or any of your colleagues? I bet you do icon smile Which one of these printing personalities are you?

The Print-all – Perhaps the most wasteful of all office staff members who prints, the ‘Print all’ prints anything and everything.  Whether it’s emails, large detailed reports or agendas for meetings, if it’s not printed for review the ‘Print all’ can’t relax.  In fact, the ‘Print all’ will often print so much that they forget what they sent to print, leaving office printers overflowing with uncollected documents at the end of each day.

The Lazy printer – This staff member – the lazy printer – doesn’t necessarily print more than anyone else in the office, but when they do, expect multiple copies to hit the printer.  That’s because rather than previewing documents before hitting “print”, the ‘Lazy printer’ prefers instead to print them than to check formatting.  This trial and error approach can often result in reams of paper being wasted until the desired result is achieved.  What’s more, the lazy printer will often print single-sided and sometimes straight to colour simply because they haven’t changed their default print settings.

The Print Wrecker – Again, the ‘Print wrecker’ isn’t necessarily a heavy printer but for some reason they always seem to be the one using the printer when it malfunctions.  While it’s difficult to determine what, if anything, the ‘Print wrecker’ does to cause such disruption when printer problems arise, they’re often hovering nervously nearby.

The Eco printer – The most frugal printer of them all, the ‘Eco-printer’ only prints what’s absolutely necessary.  When they do print expect the document to be double-sided, black and white and full with text.  For the ‘Eco-printer’, white space is wasted space.  More often than not, the ‘Eco-printer’ will be vocal in encouraging others to print less too.  Unfortunately for most organisations, ‘Eco-printers’ are few and far between and as such their efforts are frequently met with resistance.

So – do any of these make you think of yourself, colleagues or members of staff?

Want to read more about printing less? See more in this print less category

Did you recognise yourself in any of these printing personalities?

Actually, I don’t know about you, but I think I’ve seen myself as each one of those printing personalities at one time or another; scary thought.

peter signature Which one of these printing personalities are you?

Pinching in the ‘waist’ of your supply chain

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Streamlining supply chains vs losing weight

pinching in the waist of your supply chain Pinching in the ‘waist’ of your supply chainSummer is round the corner and personal trainers across the nation are rubbing their hands at the prospect of new clients wanting to shift the kilos before beach season is upon us.

This could also be true for your business. Take logistics organisations as an example:

Streamlining a supply chain can be quite easily compared to losing weight: it’s often the first 80 per cent that’s easy – it’s the remaining 20 per cent that presents the real challenge. This is the part that requires true discipline, dedication and hard work.

Streamlining supply chain logistics is not a new concept; it has been on the radar as long as those extra kilos. However, there are some fundamentals which are often overlooked. For all the effort and investment that goes into scheduling tools and other equipment, quite often there are paper based systems acting as bottlenecks. But, there are solutions:

  • Electronic forms eliminate pre-printed forms and documents by storing templates and imagery at the printer. This helps to automate time-intensive processes connected to printing labels, delivery dockets, pay slips and any other forms relevant to your organisation.
  • Optical Character Recognition and Barcode Technology can be used to instantly archive and retrieve all documents. Storing documents enables immediate access to archived documents and information
  • The most important factor of all however is customisation. This enables the seamless interaction of the entire solution with a company’s ERP system.

Conclusions for your supply chain

At the end of the day, no company wants to be weighed down by unwanted waste, so start by cutting down on waste paper, review your supply chain, and print less.

What should you consider when choosing a new printer?

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Choosing a new printer – easy or difficult?

choosing a new printer What should you consider when choosing a new printer? You’d probably think that choosing a printer is a simple task and not one worth spending a huge amount of time on. But when you think about how much a printer is used within your business and how reliant your employees are on printing documents, invoices, and so on, you might want to think twice before making a snap-decision.

Most people take the printer for granted, until it runs out of paper or toner, or stops working as a result of some obscure error. It’s at these times that you realise just how important the printer is.

Every year hundreds of new models flood the marketplace, with varying price tags and functionality, which makes choosing a new printer quite difficult. Deciding which one to pick based on pricing and spec is of course important but what’s often overlooked is the ongoing running cost. If a printer is not fit for purpose you can quickly find yourself wasting time and energy getting it fixed.

Now, we’d naturally suggest you follow the managed print services route if you’re unsure which printers to pick. This not only saves you time deciding which one to buy but also relieves you of the headaches associated with maintaining a fleet long-term.

Here’s some of the considerations we go through when working with customers to pick the most appropriate machine to meet their needs …

Printer volume
In businesses some teams need to print more than others so it’s important the office set up can meet their needs. For teams that print a lot on a regular basis it’s important to select a printer that can handle the loads put upon it – especially at peak times.

Privacy and security
While a communal, networked printer will be more cost effective than separate individual printers, there may be times where the privacy of documents necessitates a small amount of ‘private’ printers. For example, if you’re operating an open plan office it might make sense for the HR and Finance directors to have their own machines.

Document type
What your organisation prints is of course an important factor to keep in mind. If a lot of printing is done in black and white then black and white machines are naturally the preferred the option.

Processes for choosing a new printer
Businesses today often consider the information flow within their organisation at a software level without really thinking about how that information is printed.  Given invoices, delivery dockets and the like are crucial to business processes it’s worth considering how best to print these.  For example, it might be worth investing in a multi-function device that allows employees to quickly print forms directly at the machine.  This not only makes accessing forms easier but cuts down on unnecessary printing.

Choosing a new printer – Conclusion

I hope the information above helps in your decision-making. Have you had to go through this recently? I’d love to hear your thoughts on choosing a new printer, please post a Comment below – thanks in advance.