Traditional forms have been replaced at the front of salespeople's portfolios by more mouthwatering selections such as digital printing, internet solutions and bar coded products. By comparison, continuous forms and unit sets might seem like leftovers that are getting too old to enjoy.
That's why some distributors look at traditional products the same way some children look at green vegetables: Why bother thinking about them when tastier items abound?
The reason is traditional products remain vital to many end users. Despite laser printers, e-forms and the ever-threatening "paperless office," distributors are finding abundant sales opportunities for tried-and-true items. Traditional products aren't as sweet anymore, but they remain useful business utensils for clients that want to stay healthy.
Continuous Health in Medical Market
Denise Torrey first heard the phrase "paperless office" when she began her document career in 1988 at Moore Business Forms (now Mississauga, Ontario-based Moore Corporation Ltd.). "I laughed and said, 'Then what am I going to do with the rest of my life if all I know is forms?'" says Torrey, account executive at Arlington Heights, Ill.-based distributorship Printing-R-Us. "The paperless office hasn't materialized. Continuous forms are being replaced by laser forms, but I don't foresee paper products going away in my lifetime," she says.
the majority of her medical-market sales. She says most hospitals are moving toward e-forms, but doctors' offices are mainly paper-based and frequently order superbills (forms detailing which procedures doctors perform), subscription pads, envelopes, statements and insurance forms. "I'm one of the few people left who can say that I make my living offering traditional, core products," Torrey says.
Printing-R-Us competes against major, direct-selling manufacturers for medical accounts "all the time," Torrey says. Many of those clients belong to group purchasing organizations (GPOs) such as Irving, Texas-based Novation and San Diego-based Premier. (Novation has printing and forms management contracts with Moore and Dayton, Ohio-based Relizon. Premier has a dual-source contract with Moore and Dayton, Ohio-based Standard Register.) One advantage distributorships have over the big boys, Torrey says, is "the Standards and Moores of the world can't manufacture 500 or 1,000 snapouts competitively or in a timely fashion." Also, most GPOs allow hospitals to farm out a percentage of business to companies not stipulated on forms contracts. And some of those contracts don't mention e-forms, promotional products and other non-traditional items distributors provide.
Providing quality customer service is key when providing traditional products to health care clients, Torrey says. "Being at the client site at least once a week, showing your face and keeping track of inventory for customers, and just basically showing that you care--those are absolutely critical," she says.
Craving for Diversification
Traditional products account for approximately 55 percent of sales at Mission Peak Business Products, a 4-year-old distributorship in Union City, Calif. "That number is diminishing," says owner Steve Smith, "but it still represents a nice chunk of business. Bread-and-butter products in the industry are snapouts and continuous forms, and the market for those items is still significant."
Smith says many manufacturing firms still use multipart forms because the products work well for applications in which forms are routed to accounting, shipping and receiving departments. But many of Mission Peak Business Products' customers have switched from multipart forms to laser cut sheets, and Smith recognizes the decreasing demand for traditional products.
To overcome that trend, Smith recently added wearables and other promotional items to his product mix. When customers ask for those items, "I'm not going to say, 'I'm sorry, we just don't provide those,'" he says. "My customers are taking me in new directions, and I'm glad to help them get whatever they need."
Smith says it's easy for distributors with forms backgrounds to begin selling promotional products. "People who began in the industry by selling hats and shirts might have a tough time learning about the technical details of forms design," he says. Some forms professionals think it's beneath them to sell pens and mugs, Smith says, but "if we're real professionals who help companies communicate and promote their businesses, then promotional items are part of that package and we should offer them."
Tina Heil, president of Cardinal Print Group, a distributorship in West Alice, Wis., also recognizes the importance of expanding her company's offerings. Her industry background is in offset printing and computer forms, and Cardinal Print Group offers traditional products such as invoices, checks, and envelopes for billing and mailing. Conventional forms account for approximately 80 percent of the distributorship's annual sales. "People like to have some kind of paper trail, even if they have electronic systems," she says.
But when customers began flocking toward laser forms, Heil began adding new items to Cardinal Print Group's repertoire. Today, the distributorship offers a wide range of products, including binders and integrated cards. "Unit sets are just about obsolete, and I hardly see anything with carbon anymore," she says. "You have to be able to supply multiple items--labels, pens, folders, cups--so you're seen as a single source."
Heil recently sold 200,000 integrated cards to a client in the automotive industry. (Integrated products are perfed or die cut out of the same stock as the carrier.) The 30 mil, 4-color cards were attached to an 81Ž2 x 11-inch letter describing the benefits of the automotive client's membership program. The integrated cards helped the client save processing time, eliminate transposition errors and increase efficiency, Heil says.
"Traditional products will hang around," Heil says, "but the best move we can make is asking ourselves what customers will need a few years from now, not what they needed 10 years ago."
Darin Painter is managing editor of Print Solutions. Email him your comments at dpainter@PSDA.org.
Thanks to Madison Forms Corp., McFarland, Wis., for assistance.
