Gartner, Inc., the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company, released a report that claimed a 1 to 3% of an organization’s entire annual revenues were deployed to cover internal printing costs. Later, International Datagroup (IDC) independently confirmed the logic of these estimates. This suggests a total global spending of about $150 billion on printing devices, consumables and maintenance.
Gartner’s analysis pointed to the areas of print expense waste that often invade large organizations. Among other things, they included excess capacity, lack of standardization, obsolete or aged devices, unmanaged supplies and user printing, proliferation of small expensive desktop units and fragmented maintenance and service contracts.  All together, Gartner suggested that “print is the last bastion of savings” in enterprise IT. Also, Gartner pointed to savings of 10 to 30% that are realistically attainable when implementing a print management program.

The market responded with vigor.  Many companies stepped forward to help CIOs, CFOs, and other executives save money that could, of course, be rededicated for more productive purposes. Large, multinational printer and copier vendors, in addition to the legion of Value Added Resellers (VARs) representing multiple lines, became involved in this search with their clients through “complimentary print assessment”.

Sadly, the value of these free print assessments has been questioned throughout North America. Customers expected objective advice from their hardware vendors to help them achieve real and measurable cost reductions. Rather, they often received reports, or more properly “proposals”, for new print products and services that promised rapid return on investment, as if infrastructure was all that was standing in the way of success.

So the question is: Is Gartner’s print-based hidden cost savings viable or an illusion? Are there key factors for success underlying a print assessment? Is there a proven process, if diligently followed that will deliver organizations to this promised 10 to 30% print savings? The answers to these questions is ‘yes’. With our experience and knowledge of the industry we can cut the guesswork and deliver real savings.