“Green is In.”  If you call it “Green” or “Sustainability,” people listen.  It seems that every product company or service has a Green message.  You could say Green is the new “Black.”  So what does “Being in the Black” have in common with Green as it relates to a Printing and Imaging Strategy?   Being in the Black is the opposite of Being in the Red—it means to be profitable.  Remember when duplex printing was sold as a way to save paper?  It wasn’t really about saving paper or trees, it was about saving money.  The opportunity to save green while going Green presents a tremendous opportunity for organizations to both save money and preserve our environment.

Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it?  Recycle a few cartridges, duplex my prints, and I have “Greened” my print environment.  Unfortunately, as Kermit so wisely put it, “It’s Not Easy Being Green.”  Most companies do not possess an environmental action plan that will measure and manage the output environment, as well as provide data driven recommendations and improvements that contribute to cost savings and an improved Carbon Footprint.  BMI+ImageNet conducts thorough environmental assessments, with the strong belief that what gets measured gets managed, and what gets managed gets done. 

We give our customers answers to these questions:

• What are your company’s per-page print costs, including supplies and support?
• What are your company’s imaging-related energy costs?
• What is the carbon footprint of your company’s imaging fleet?

To answer those, however, our “Green Assessment” specialists must address many other questions:

• Are individual printers common on desktops?
• Are many different makes and models in use throughout the enterprise?
• Are different devices used for printing, faxing, copying, and scanning?
• Are many devices outdated, i.e., more than five years old?
• Are documents typically printed on only one side of a sheet of paper?
• Do people tend to print documents, then retrieve them later, or never at all?
• Do devices remain on at nights and on weekends?
• Do you manage device settings individually for each device?
• Are recycling of paper, print cartridges, and old equipment consistently managed?
• Are devices unmanaged, preventing you from tracking physical location and determining usage and who has access?

If you answer yes to one or more of those questions, consider each a potential area to focus your efforts.  While these actions may have limited individual impact, collectively they represent a broad opportunity to reduce the environmental impacts of printing and imaging. 

Creating an environmental action plan to identify your opportunities and challenges requires an audit of your company’s current environment.  Key questions to ask include:

• What individual (desktop) and shared printers, copiers, scanners, fax, and multifunction devices are in use?
• What are the device details:  make, model, and purchase date, as well as capabilities, service record, and energy-efficiency certifications?
• Where does each device sit and who has access?
• What is the ratio of users to devices?
• Which devices are networked?
• Which devices meet eco-label qualification, such as ENERGY STAR?
• Which devices are duplex-enabled? 

It is also critical to assess printing behaviors and the decisions that drive them:

• Where do people print, copy, scan, and fax?
• How many sheets of paper do employees use each year?
• What is the ratio of black and white printing to color?
• Do you expect an increased need for color printing?
• What is the ratio of single-sided to two-sided (duplex) printing?
• Do you enable duplex printing on a large scale?
• Can you establish printer settings at the network level?
• Do you use power management tools and software?
• Do you employ remote monitoring of devices across your network?
• How are print cartridges, paper, and hardware disposed of at end of use?
• Are lost or forgotten print jobs common?

You should determine how your company purchases printing and imaging related equipment and supplies:

• Does your company have preferred vendors for printing and imaging equipment?
• Does procurement factor in total cost of ownership (such as energy cost), helpful in comparing the full impact of different devices?
• Do you have opportunities or incentives to incorporate environmental factors into purchasing decisions?
• Does your company buy post-consumer recycled paper from a certified supplier?

Understand how employees perceive and use printing and imaging:

• Is convenience key?  Reliability?  Color?
• Do people print and retrieve jobs right away?
• Do people demonstrate concern about the environmental impact of printing?
• Do you have widespread paper and print cartridge recycling efforts?

Determine the broader context for your plan:

• Is your action plan supporting a large cost-cutting or environmental strategy?
• How are goals stated—dollars, hours, energy uses, carbon footprint?
• How are your company Greening products and services? Supply Chain? Operations?
• Does your company produce an annual environmental report?

BMI+ImageNet will assess the current work environment, find the inefficiencies, refresh the old technology, keep what is working, and implement a Green plan for reducing waste and recycling.  In the end, you will receive just one monthly bill that is lower than your current total print cost.  Click here to calculate your savings and environmental impact.

The future of wide format print technology has never looked brighter! The broad range of wide format print applications and affordability of ownership are presenting possibilities to a new set of users. Enhanced print quality, print durability, increased production speeds and eco-friendly solutions all translate to huge benefits for clients interested in integrating wide format inkjet technology into their daily workflow.

QUALITY IS KEY

            Quality is a key factor in the world of wide format printing. Advances in ink formulation, media coating and software solutions are delivering previously unimaginable quality for the   entire spectrum of wide format printing professionals. Photographers, sign makers, architects, GIS professionals, corporate users and many more can reap the benefits of great new wide format technologies.

            HP Vivera inks can 72.9 million brilliant colors. Combined with quality media solutions, the rich Vivera inks can resist fading up to 108 years while maintaining water resistance and print handling durability.

            Canon’s LUCIA ink is specially formulated to reduce graininess and bronzing and resist scratching and fading. Black, Matte Black, Gray and Photo Gray optimize black ink density for exceptional monochrome photo-quality output. Based on the type of media used, the iPF8100 printer chooses the black ink that achieves the best print results. 

SPEED

Wide format users require quick turn around for their quality prints, and print speeds have never been faster in the inkjet worlds. Engineering, architecture and GIS professionals can now see size D prints (24”x36”) produced in as little as 45 seconds. Photography, proofing and marketing professionals can receive high quality, color-rich size D prints in less than 5 minutes. These amazing print speeds occur without sacrificing quality or permanence. 

BE SMART…GO GREEN

Perhaps the most exciting developments in the wide format world relate to our increasingly environmentally-conscious society. Eco-friendly ink technology, recycled media options and recycling efforts balance environmental responsibility with low cost wide format printing more easily than ever before.

The new latex print technology from HP helps clients distinguish their business and attract new environmentally focused customers by offering a complete solution—including water-based HP Latex Inks and HP recyclable media that helps reduce the impact of printing on the environment. The HP Designjet latex printer L25500 makes post-print production easy with prints that come off the printer dry and ready for lamination, packaging, shipping, and display. This HP Designjet meets strict energy efficiency guidelines and helps keep costs down without the need for an external dryer or special ventilation equipment.

To address recycling, HP has developed the HP Planet Partners Recycling Program. The program has expanded to include recyclable HP graphics and technical media from sign and banner materials to films and backlit materials. HP’s state-of-the-art processes ensure that the plastics used in these printing materials get recycled in a way that conserves resources.

For our part, Digital Media Warehouse can assist with our ink cartridge recycling program. Select wide format ink cartridges can be returned (free of shipping expense) in exchange for cash or product credit. The end result is a fully warranted reusable print cartridge with all the same benefits of OEM ink cartridges, at a fraction of OEM costs. By participating in our ink recycling program, clients benefit not only the environment, but their bottom line.

Many people mistakenly confuse document management with the ability to scan and archive documents for later retrieval. Although that represents one small part of document management and certainly saves time and money if ever a document is needed again, it should not be confused with a document management system. A quality document management system should be comprised of the former along with an automated process for moving documents from department to department or workflow on the way to the documents’ eventual archival. Archiving can save some money, but allowing a document management system to prioritize who sees documents and in what order provides the single biggest cost savings. Once a document has been reviewed, simply approving and closing it moves it along a workflow process.

Every department within a business possesses documents requiring review at a certain stage. Some departments, like accounts payable and receiving, handle documents that necessitate marrying before paying a bill. Such processes can be automated, thus saving time and avoiding slowing the pace through misplacement of documents. These slowdowns can cause lost payment discounts or interruption in the daily workflow process, leading to staff friction and lost productivity.

When businesses implement a fully automated document management system, they normally find it difficult to quantify savings. At first, they must operate two systems, while the bugs work out of the new one. This causes employee frustration due to the additional workload. Management must remain steadfast through the implementation process, remembering how greatly the long term benefits outweigh any short term pain the new system may cause!

Management should also avoid taking on too much, too fast. Automating one process or department at a time proves a wise course. Most vendors and companies alike lack the manpower to manage simultaneous implementation. Moving carefully while prioritizing the highest needs will ensure a more seamless implementation. Once implementing an automated document management system and operating it for at least six months, businesses can begin to see the enormous value.

Dual monitors provide another huge time and print saver within the workflow of documents.  Dual monitors improve accuracy and conserve time for any staff member working with two or more software programs, through reducing toggling between programs. Lacking a second monitor, most people print from one program to add information to another. This practice wastes time and money.

Legacy Files

Which documents should a company scan into the new document management system? Many businesses take the “from this point forward” approach. It eliminates several unwelcome processes: having to determine which old files to scan, perhaps hiring an outside company to orchestrate the scanning, and paying to scan the files. Not scanning the old files reduces the initial value of immediate retrieval and the cost savings for no longer-needed file cabinets and old boxes. A cost analysis can determine the value of legacy file scanning.

Disaster Recovery

Retrieving needed documents with a few keystrokes delivers one of the great benefits of electronic archiving. This holds true in case of disaster. With a well planned backup system, traditional paper files otherwise destroyed by fire or natural disaster return on line in no time. As many businesses have found out with the increase in hurricanes and other acts of God, electronic file storage can save a business and careers.

Environmental Impact

You can profoundly impact the environment when optimizing document workflow, particularly through reducing the amount of prints or copies. Following are a few important facts about printing:

• Each employee prints an average of six wasted pages per day
• Forty five percent of printed paper winds up in the trash
• Americans annually throw away enough paper to heat 50 million homes for twenty years
• Rather than recycling print cartridges, Americans dispose of eight cartridges per second
• One print cartridge requires 3.5 quarts of oil to make
• Recycling one cartridge four times saves 3.5 pounds of solid waste from going into a landfill

Designing a document management system that improves paper usage allows your company to help save the environment, while saving your own time and money.

HARDWARE

While we offer you a multitude of top-quality products and services, these break out into three major, though compatible, areas—hardware, document management, and managed print services.  Let’s first examine our hardware products, though that name has grown rather inaccurate, due to the amazing software capacities they now possess.

BMI+ImageNet is an authorized dealer for multi-function devices—the remarkable descendants of traditional copying machines—from two of the greatest names in international business, Canon and Hewlett-Packard (HP). Canon has been one of the great pillars in building BMI+ImageNet. We now stand as one of the top-ranked Canon independent dealers in America. Meanwhile, we not only place millions of dollars worth of equipment each year from HP—the most successful information technological company in the world—but we are one of only a handful of HP Elite Dealers in the America. 

With Canon and HP, not only do we provide you the most versatile and dependable such machines on the market, we maximize your efficiency by building them into our Total Solutions programs for our customers.

DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT

When BMI+ImageNet determined several years ago the crucial place document management software would play in our future service to our customers, we launched an exhaustive, nationwide investigation of the options. At length, we chose Laserfiche, the most robust solution on the market for the paperless workflow of documents. This remarkable software, working in concert with our other products, can save your business innumerable hours of time through eliminating manual movement of documents from department to department, and immediately retrieving images without the cumbersome need of paper files.

Perhaps a few eye-opening numbers from the renowned Gartner Group demonstrate just how critical the need for document management in nearly any business.

• $30 average cost to file one document
• $120 to find a misfiled document 
• $220 to reproduce a lost document
• 7.5% of all documents get lost
• 90% of all papers handled are shuffled

The most dramatic statistic of all?  The average professional worker spends fully ONE-HALF of his or her career searching for documents!  The immense personal and corporate importance of obtaining the best possible document management software should be obvious.

Let’s examine some of the situations that our document management service will address and help you solve, toward the ultimate end of attaining information solutions that improve your bottom line.

Space – We save companies space. Think about the amount of your square footage taken up by filing cabinets and paper boxes. How about devoting this valuable space toward growth or reducing your rent? And why spend utilities on unneeded space? A well-designed document management system can reduce your needed office space by as much as 7%.

Time – We save you time. Every lost or misplaced document costs time and money. As mentioned, the average office worker spends around half their day looking for documents needed to do their job? What if you could find any document in your organization in seconds through searching by word, document name, check number, or any other thought that pops into your head?

Disaster and Recovery – We protect you from disaster. What is your paper disaster plan? What if your sprinkler system malfunctions? What if you have a fire or flood? We can provide a plan to have you up and running within minutes following a disaster. Why run the risk of losing your documents when you can implement a plan that eliminates worry? We will help you recover. A well-oiled recovery plan can prevent your losing valuable time and critical documents. By organizing a well thought-through backup plan, your business could be saved the time and cost of recovering the very documents you need to maintain it.

Security – We help keep you safe. Are your paper documents secure? By organizing a document management system, our consultants can make sure only the people needed to see and use important documents can do so. Proper security can protect your company from disgruntled employees or ex-employees.

So what do others besides us say about Laserfiche and our document management program?  Data Systems Consultants, Inc. has stood in the forefront of Oklahoma information technology and solutions for over two decades.  Their President, Dan Lessman, says:  “BMI+ImageNet’s cooperation and commitment to provide a comprehensive and efficient solution for ITL has been outstanding in every way, most especially given the complex processes that this firm must operate under. As you are all aware, this was not an easy problem to address. Certainly, the typical canned solution would not have done it…This has been one of the best and most productive projects that I’ve ever enjoyed.” Sharon Franklin, Accounting Manager for Oklahoma City-based Neighbors Coffee, states:  “BMI+ImageNet’s staff was excellent to work with from start to finish. The Laserfiche installation process was quick and precise. Our trainer was absolutely wonderful to work with and helped us develop workflows and efficient processes. BMI+ImageNet has been a great asset to our company and we are delighted to have our paperless office on the way to the future.”  Piedmont Schools ranks as one of the largest and fastest-growing school districts in the state of Oklahoma.  So pleased is Piedmont that we introduced and implemented Laserfiche for them, that their superintendent delivers a training presentation to all of our own newly-hired Document Management Consultants, explaining the attributes and value of Laserfiche from a customer’s viewpoint!

A myriad of ways exist to print documents. Most businesses face a lack of control in managing this output. Most of the outside or off-campus printing is managed through purchasing and can be controlled through a bidding process. Control is lost, however, through local printing. Prints run in every department, on all types of equipment. Ink Jet and Laser Printers produce without any reporting structure. This produces enormous waste in time and money, and inflicts tremendous damage on the environment. Most companies split the purchasing of printers between two departments—single function printers to the IT group and multi-function printers to facilities management. How did this unusual circumstance originate?

Let’s go back a few years ago when facilities managers authorized the purchasing of copying equipment. Not that long ago, copiers only copied and did not serve as printers. As they grew more sophisticated, however, the printing feature was added. Most businesses did not change the structure of purchasing when this occurred. Since printers went on the network early on, they became part of the IT infrastructure and were placed under the IT department to purchase and manage. Copiers, meanwhile, did not go on the network, and thus did not fall under IT.

Now the two products have merged, yet most companies have not adjusted the management of their printing process. This has generated stress between purchasing and the IT group. Sometimes the choice is made by IT based on price rather than ease of management. Conversely, IT sometimes chooses printers based on the ease of putting them on the network, rather than the cost of operation. When purchasing printers, either single or multi-function, both considerations should be studied before purchasing. Purchasing and IT should work together to leverage the best of both worlds, reducing cost while saving the IT group time and management hassles.

A managed print provider can improve the process of printing by helping oversee the use of all printers within the business. New technologies can scan networks to find all printers sitting on the network. These scans can find meter readings and network addresses, and sometimes determine coverage ratios and other data. They cannot usually find locally connected printers and they sometimes miss printers that cannot send proper protocol to be seen. Nevertheless, this represents a good place to start in locating printers within an organization.

The next step in the process is the old fashioned “walking the floors.” As a MPS provider walks the floors, they can print configuration pages from printers that give detailed information regarding the printers’ past. These pages help determine the rate of coverage, number of cartridges used, total meter count, and more.

As the MPS provider walks the floors, they should execute a mapping that shows the locations of all printers. This mapping later serves to determine the best locations for printers, the type needed, and the optimum number. A thorough printing research project should include a meeting with accounts payable to determine the current expenditures for the equipment, service, and supplies. Many multi-function machines get leased, while most single function printers are purchased. Costs should be pulled related to dollars spent on cartridges for Ink Jet and Laser printers, as well as service calls and maintenance contracts purchased by the company.

Once the mapping and data collection conclude, the MPS provider can generate a report on the current state of printing in the company. Some providers charge for this research, while others conduct it for free in hopes of achieving a long-term business relationship with the client. Immediately following this report, a recommendation report should demonstrate a more efficient layout and use of printers. Remember that all printers are not equal. It usually makes sense to distribute the most printing to the least expensive device. However, convenience needs to form a part of the equation, and recommendations should include the needs of the people within the department. Cheapest isn’t always best in printing a document.

It only makes sense in choosing a MPS provider, to select a company that can manage the entire fleet. Without having one company in charge, your best interest can suffer when a single function printer provider attempts to move prints to these devices, while a multi-function printer provider tries to move prints to their devices. A total management provider should have the company’s best interest in mind, moving prints to the most practical devices and improving the bottom line.

A quality MPS provider should provide reports quarterly and recommendations semiannually on ways the company can eliminate or move prints to lower cost devices without causing hardships on employees. These reports should include prints by device and new technologies to control printing, since these technologies continue to improve. A relationship with a MPS provider should require that the provider continually strive to improve printing within your printing environment. (to be continued…see DOCUMENT WORK FLOW)

Once a document is created, if needed in print, this becomes the first highly wasteful part of the document workflow process. Many forms of printing take place, at tremendous cost to a company. Analysis reveals that somewhere between one and six percent of a company’s top line revenue is spent on printing in its various forms. Outside of payroll, it can comprise one of the largest expense line items.

Most companies produce short run or convenience printing on one of three types of devices—local printers, single function laser printers, or multi-function or “all in one” printers.

LOCAL PRINTERS

The first and most expensive printer on a per page basis is the Ink Jet. These prints can range from five to fifty cents per page, depending on the device. The cost of one gallon of this ink, if you could purchase it that way, can range up to $3,200. Manufacturers produce low cost printers to promote the usage of this highly profitable ink. They use the “give away the razor to get the blade business” approach. Businesses have little control of the purchase of these printers since they can be hidden in an office supply purchase.

Additionally, these ink cartridges cost around $30 and get purchased around most companies’ purchasing systems, making it easy for them to “fall through the budgetary cracks.” Most of these types of printers are localized and off the radar of IT

departments. Many IT departments see printing as a necessary evil and if it isn’t on their network, then it isn’t in there purview. When these types of printers break, they get discarded, causing a repeat purchase and a detriment to the environment. The second most expensive approach to printing a document is a “single function” laser printer. These printers can be localized or put on a network. Although still relatively inexpensive to purchase, IT usually purchases and controls them. When these printers break, they typically get fixed rather than trashed.

The cost per page on most single function laser printers remains in excess of two cents for black and white, and over ten cents for color. In all single function printers, coverage or the amount of ink or toner placed on a page determines the actual cost. HP has run extensive studies that determine the average page possesses a five percent coverage ratio. Obviously, coverage is determined by the type of application is run on a printer.  The final and least expensive cost per page for localized short run printing is the multi-function or “all in one” printer. These units rank as the most expensive to acquire, but typically cost less than one cent per page for black and white and from five to ten cents for color. This type of printer nearly always resides on the network. Pricing per page on these units is determined on monthly volume, the higher the volume, the lower the cost.

Describing a multi-function printer and its functionality usually starts with a glass on top for scanning. Other features typically include document feeders, finishing options like sorting, stapling, hole punching, etc., multiple drawers for multiple sizes of paper, fax capability and email.

These products are feature-rich, sometimes so much so, that companies buy more product than needed. The 11 x 17 paper feature represents a classic example of   overbuying. This feature comprises only five percent of the pages produced, yet appears on ninety five percent of multi-function machines. A very costly feature, 11 x 17 requires a larger machine, with a larger glass and engine. It typically adds fifty percent or more to the cost of the equipment.

On-Demand Printing

On-demand printing has been around for years and provides printing at an even lower cost. It requires more volume than a typical locally-produced job, but still constitutes a viable option for a medium volume of prints—usually between 100 and 1,000 of the same original. Sometimes, on-demand produces one off or variable printing. This type of printing involves the same original document with slight variations such as names and addresses.

These types of jobs require proofing and delivery, complicating them more than localized printing; whether the job will go off campus or stay local in the company’s in-house printing department depends on the size of the company. Many vendors offer on-demand printing, and in metropolitan areas, they usually reside nearby. Localized printers cannot match the quality and price an on-demand printer can produce on a larger project.

Offset Printing

The oldest and most traditional style of printing, offset still provides the highest quality at the lowest cost, depending on volume. You cannot produce variable printing on offset, and it normally requires a minimum of one thousand or more of the same original to produce product at a lower cost than on-demand. This type of printing requires plate making, proofing, and delivery, and almost always gets done off campus, regardless the size of the company. (to be continued…SEE MANAGED PRINT)

Document management should be considered a cradle to grave solution for documents.  In its simplest terms, documents must be captured, distributed, and archived. Traditional document management follows a primitive, expensive, and inefficient process. First, documents are created electronically and then printed.  Once printed, they are distributed by various styles. The following represent traditional approaches:  mailed, faxed, emailed, hand delivery, courier delivery, overnight delivery, etc.

All these method help form a workflow that is part of a business’s fabric. As documents work their way through this workflow, many opportunities for waste occur in the process. Besides the time it takes for people to prepare and move these documents, opportunities for documents to get lost or misplaced grow common place. Once this happens, recreation is required at—enormous cost. National consultancies such as the Gartner Group estimate this cost at between $120 and $230 per document, depending on whether it has to be created or just found. Either way, considering that 15% of documents wind up one of these two ways, document distribution is an expensive proposition in the document management process.

Finally, documents get to their final destination—either destroyed or archived for future use. The traditional archiving of documents is the use of file cabinets and boxes. The first stop in the archival process is usually a file cabinet. These documents were created recently and possess the likelihood to be required again. If needed, they are logically placed in some type of order for retrieval. Over time, as these documents age, they are purged and moved into cardboard boxes for long term storage.

Often, these documents are rarely needed, so businesses offload their boxes to long term storage facilities until the unlikely event they are needed. Such storage companies charge monthly storage fees, as well as retrieval fees, destruction fees, and other fees to terminate the storage of the boxed document.

Computers have given rise to an enormous ability to create documents. The simplicity of the creation process has caused the need for more efficient methods to manage these documents. Although incredible electronic methods have emerged to manage these documents, rarely do businesses invest in the technology to do so. Most of the investment has been on the creation side of the document, rather than the distribution, archival, and retrieval. (to be continued…see PRINTING on future blogs)

BMI+ImageNet prides itself on beginning to end management of the document life cycle. With state of the art capture, distribution and archival solutions, our company can improve your company’s document efficiencies, saving time and money.