Properly managing your printed materials budget is critical in today’s environment. With a hyper focus on ROI, every marketing dollar spent must return value in dollars, new customers generated, deeper product penetration, etc. In addition to determining what needs to be printed and when, you must also choose the right print partner to produce these items. Should you choose to partner with a print manager, and I highly recommend you do, be sure to ask about digital printing and print-on-demand services as a way to reduce print and inventory costs.
So what is print-on-demand? Print-on-demand is a production method that allows companies to produce certain low demand items only when necessary. The alternative is to produce high demand items in large quantities in order to keep ample stock on hand for sales and marketing reps. Let me share an example of these 2 methods. We were approached by a business that was looking for a more efficient way to manage their sales collateral inventory. Their current method consisted of producing all items, putting them in inventory, and when one item ran out, they would simply order more. They knew there was a more cost effective way to manage these items but needed an expert to help them achieve it. After examining run rates (demand for an item in a certain period of time), production time, stagnant inventory costs, and inventory obsolescence costs, we were able to split their mix of marketing material into 2 groups – Inventory & Print-On-Demand. While all items would be listed in their customized E-STORE, only the Inventory items would incur production costs up-front while the Print-On-Demand items would not incur any up-front production costs as we would not print those items until requested and do so in manageable quantities reducing stagnant inventory and obsolescence. The implementation of this new model of marketing materials management helped our customer reduce overall print costs, reduce stress, and maximize ROI.
So take a look at your current management model and ask yourself if print-on-demand could help you as well. If so, call us for a quick review, we’re happy to help!
