Print management
Print management is a purchasing service for printed matter and marketing materials from an external provider. The aim is to realize savings through improved purchasing from suitable suppliers and lean processes. As a rule, a permanent collaboration is agreed over several years.
Terminology
Print management is a modular service provided by an external provider to support companies in the procurement of printed matter and marketing materials (print materials). The print manager has access to a comprehensive network of potential suppliers, which enables him to identify the optimal supplier for each print piece. As a managed services provider, the print manager not only buys the print materials, but also offers a holistic solution that is individually tailored to the needs of the client. At the customer's request, all process steps that are run through in the procurement of the individual items can be supported.
The print manager acts as a technical advisor to optimize the print specifications and is the link between the client and the respective supplier. Thanks to his holistic knowledge of the market, he can continuously offer the client state-of-the-art products and identify trends and innovations at an early stage. Client and supplier benefit equally from this.
A clear distinction must be made between the terms “print management” and “ managed print services ”, as the latter describes the efficient design of print output within a company.
Print materials mostly fall into the category of indirect materials and in most cases can be assigned to the group of C articles . These materials are characterized by a large number of order items and a relatively low purchasing volume. In many companies, an average of 60% of the orders are for C-articles, which, however, only make up around 5% of the total purchase value.
The costs from the administrative effort that arise with every order determine a relatively high proportion of the total costs for C items - compared to A and B items. In addition, the procurement of print materials is usually not part of the company's core competence . As a rule, these focus on optimizing the procurement of their main products and can then no longer leverage the savings potential in the purchase of C-articles due to a lack of resources. This results in the added value that print managers offer, as they have specialized in the procurement of such articles.
Market situation
The supplier market in the print sector is characterized by its high level of intransparency. In Germany alone there are around 10,000 companies in the printer industry - most of them SMEs. In addition, the ever faster technical development and internationalization are influencing factors. The technical infrastructure enables the steadily advancing digitization of data. Regional advantages are diminished due to increasing internationalization and falling transport costs. In this environment, printing companies will only assert themselves with a clearly defined profile. This in turn leads to a further consolidation of the market.
In this environment, it is becoming increasingly difficult for buyers to find the ideal supplier for every product at any time. For this reason, more and more companies are choosing to work with an external service provider. A few years ago, 9% of the German print market was handled by print managers, in 2013 a rate of 27% is expected.
Use
Print management offers the client many opportunities to save costs and optimize processes, as well as opportunities for the respective suppliers.
Benefits for the contracting company:
- Achieving the greatest possible savings potential: The print manager usually has a large network of suppliers that he has built up over years of experience. This network ensures that the products can be assigned to the appropriate suppliers. By bundling orders, further savings can be achieved due to economies of scale .
- First-class procurement of printed matter without your own, costly resources: Setting up your own specialized purchasing department in the area of print materials is costly, time-consuming and resource-intensive. Print materials can be procured via the print manager without tying up these resources. In this way, the contracting company not only achieves savings through optimized purchasing of print materials, but also through reduced process costs.
- Cost transparency and control of purchasing processes and prices: The client company can use individual reporting to see exactly how much has been spent on purchasing print materials in a certain period - across departments. With clearly defined SLAs , effectiveness and efficiency can be checked by the commissioning company.
- Takeover of quality, complaint and supplier management: By taking over complaint and supplier management by the service provider, the client can realize savings through lean internal processes. The print manager has proven experts who carry out audits and improvements with the supplier. Results are recorded over time. The print manager can also take over quality management.
Benefits for the supplier:
- Additional orders: By being included in the print manager's pool of suppliers, print shops have the opportunity to receive additional orders from other contracting companies - without much additional effort.
- Efficient utilization of capacities: By bundling orders, suppliers can better utilize their own capacities and optimize procedural processes.
- Process optimization: Professional and specialized contact persons as well as the allocation of structured and qualified inquiries / orders by the print manager enable the suppliers to check and optimize their own processes.
- Continuous development: In close cooperation with the print manager, print shops can develop continuously, as they benefit from the expertise of the print manager and are informed of market trends early on in order to shape them.
Tasks and problems
“The company's purchasing departments are under immense pressure. The framework conditions are becoming more and more complex and with lower budgets "more" should be procured in the same quality. "
The main tasks in print purchasing are therefore to find the best supplier for every product, in every edition and at every point in time - in terms of quality and price. To do this, a network of suppliers must be set up in which this supplier can be identified. The pool must be large enough to ensure the delivery of print products even at peak production times. The coordination of such a pool is very demanding and requires qualified staff who are trained in the field of print and / or media. Only with as precise a knowledge of the market as possible is it possible to stay up-to-date in the long term, identify trends early on and implement them in a targeted manner.
In many companies, print materials are procured locally by the respective departments - marketing the advertising material, the warehouse the packaging and the personnel department the business cards. This makes it very time-consuming to measure the purchasing volume precisely. The task here is to centralize the procurement structures and make them uniform. This is the only way to make results measurable and to identify potential savings. Internal (the respective departments) and external (e.g. graphic designers, advertising agencies, logisticians ) departments must be efficiently coordinated in order to guarantee a smooth process flow. The print manager should save more costs than he causes, year after year. Often, however, indirect purchasing cannot oblige all employees to purchase via the print manager.
However, since effective outsourcing is only available from a six-figure purchase volume, problems can arise in covering the project costs incurred if the necessary volume cannot be achieved through decentralized procurement parallel to the print manager.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from February 18, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ [1] (PDF; 157 kB)
- ↑ p. 22; Friedrichsen, Mike: Print management - a challenge for printing and publishing companies in the digital age PM through the ages Nomos, Baden-Baden 2004, ISBN 978-3-8329-0556-9
- ↑ Lammich, Carola: Print Management Customers: Opportunity or Risk for Print Service Providers? In: Deutscher Drucker No. 32, October 25, 2012, p. 9 f
- ↑ http://www.arvato-services-cim.com/uploads/tx_nwnews/arvato-cim0210-6Seiter-de.pdf ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
literature
- Friedrichsen, Mike: Print management - a challenge for printing and publishing companies in the digital age PM through the ages Nomos, Baden-Baden 2004, ISBN 978-3-8329-0556-9
- Lammich, Carola: Print Management Customers: Opportunity or Risk for Print Service Providers? In: Deutscher Drucker No. 32, October 25, 2012, p. 9 f.