Print Solutions Magazine

Several attendees at DMIA’s Print Solutions 2005 Conference & Expo in Orlando chatted with me at the event about a challenge they face—trumpeting their companies’ value to prospects who first want to talk about price. I imagine salespeople in every industry face the same obstacle, but it’s now a momentous topic in the largely commoditized printing industry, whose salespeople want to be known as solution providers instead of product peddlers.

When a prospect asks, “How much will 5,000 32-page, black-and-white training manuals cost?” he or she is referring to exactly that—the cost of the printed manuals. Most end users focus on production cost per page and the number at the bottom of the invoice. Comparatively few realize that for each dollar they spend on printing, they spend an additional six dollars on the creation, management, warehousing and inventory, distribution and fulfillment, and obsolescence of the printed product, according to CAP Ventures, a strategic consulting firm for providers and users of digital business communication technologies and services.

That means a company with annual revenues of $500 million spends $10 million on printing and finishing services, and an additional $60 million on associated process costs. To the extent those process costs can be reduced—by enhancing employee productivity, diminishing waste due to obsolescence, increasing customer satisfaction and more—savings accrued by improving process efficiencies will fall directly to the bottom line. On process costs of $60 million, even 10 percent cost savings (easily achievable with efficient management of the business communications process) almost offsets the cost of the actual printing, according to CAP Ventures.

In most cases, customers should worry about cost of the process, not the product. The onus is on printing companies to help them see the light. Distributors today have significant opportunities to improve their customers’ productivity and efficiency by addressing activities that take place before and after materials are printed. When a prospect asks about the price of business documents, salespeople should consider the human capital required to create, manage, produce and distribute them: Why was the document printed? What business purpose is the document serving? How did the document go from a software system to manufactured output?

I think the best long-term answer for printing firms is leveraging the power of the web and digital printing to gain control of document-related expenses. End users are demanding shorter runs and more targeted pieces, and on-demand color printing is becoming more affordable. The most efficient way to produce and distribute the training manuals mentioned earlier is for the client to create the content and upload it to a web-based document repository. Using web-to-print technology, the end user could modify the document when necessary, customize specifications (paper weight, spine and cover inserts, finishing process), specify ship-to address(es), and authorize access to the digital files to others in the organization. Lead times would reduce significantly, and orders could be placed anytime and anywhere by using a secure internet site. The client could check production and shipping statuses and have access to customize usage reports and real-time warehousing data.

Web-to-print technology is the future of our industry, and it’s an ideal way distributors can help their clients realize that value trumps price.