Solution partners win when customers print their own marketing materials

In-house is in, at least when it comes to color printing. A growing number of small, mid-sized and enterprise-class businesses are expanding internal color-printing operations so they can create their own brochures, fliers, pamphlets and other marketing communications materials.

It’s a trend that may not sit well with commercial quick-print shops and offset printers. But solution partners see a significant opportunity for higher profit margins through sales of color printers and multifunction products (MFPs), consumables, support services and consulting advice that helps customers take advantage of potential cost savings and efficiencies.

Why the move to in-house color printing? A recent survey conducted by Internal Communications Research concluded that the prime reason 500 small and mid-sized companies print more of their color marketing materials in-house comes down to economics. ROI is greater with this strategy than when commercial third-parties do the work, the researcher said.

“Small and medium business customers are spending about $26 billion in the U.S. in printing outsourcing,” adds Anneliese Olson, Hewlett-Packard’s director of Laser Jet category management, imaging and printing in the Americas. “If those companies bring that work in house, they will save a significant amount of money.”

Solution providers have four key selling points to convince customers that expanding their in-house marketing operations makes business sense.

First, in-house operations offer greater control of quantities. Rather than requiring a minimum print run that may surpass the quantity needs of an individual project, in-house operations allow marketing departments to produce only the optimum number of materials. Some estimates peg overrun waste from commercial minimums at 15-to-20 percent of the job cost.

Second, advances in color printing technology are making printers and MFPs more economical and easier to use than ever. Leading equipment vendors like Brother, Hewlett-Packard, Lexmark, Ricoh, Xerox and others, have dropped prices for color devices by about 80 percent over the last four years, according to some industry estimates.

At the same time, the devices are able to do more. For example, Xerox Corp.’s DocuColor 240 offers 2400- by 2400-dpi color printing, as well as copying and scanning. The unit also provides a range of finishing capabilities, including stapling, saddle stitching for booklets, automated “V” folding and hole punching.

Third, printer vendors now offer a variety of support services to help end users expand their in-house marketing operations and help solution partners promote the benefits of in-house printing. Hewlett-Packard manages a printing portal that provides design advice and links to third-parties that sell stock images and logo design services that bring a professional look to marketing materials (see http://www.hp.com/sbso/productivity/office/index.html).

Fourth, and perhaps most compelling of all, cost comparisons between in-house strategies and outsourced printing show the advantages of keeping jobs close at hand.

One estimate puts the average cost per page of an HP Color LaserJet 4730 MFP at about 7.2 cents per page, including paper and all consumables, or approximately $3.59 for a total print run of 50 pages. The same job completed by a quick-print shop or an offset printer would cost $47.50 or $263, respectively. At that rate, the 4730 would see an acquisition-cost ROI after printing the equivalent of 20 offset-printing jobs.