Taking a Lean approach in 2016

We’re not talking about shedding post-Christmas indulgence here, we’re talking about applying Lean thinking beyond the warehouse door, and specifically around managing printer fleets.

Managed Print Services (MPS) is actively managing and optimising document output devices and it’s now widely used by large enterprises to reduce both cost and waste of office printers, copiers and other imaging equipment: SMEs have yet to embrace the service model as fully as their peers.

Research body IDC identified some years ago that MPS could reduce overall print costs by up to 30% and to this day, many CIOs are shocked to learn that company print spend can be as high as 3% of their organisation’s revenue. Few appreciate that it’s not just the hard costs of hardware, maintenance and supplies but the less obvious costs like procurement and administration, helpdesk support, energy consumption and waste.

MPS supports all the principles of Lean Management in terms of eliminating waste and cutting out processes that don’t add value to an organisation. Yet for all its maturity and widespread adoption in front offices, few enterprises seem to have considered the concept for their back office printers, for those machines that churn out all-important media like barcodes and picking lists.

Mismanaging such equipment absorbs money that could be better spent on more strategic IT improvements. But to manage better, organisations must first have full visibility of their printer fleet, to know how many and what types of printers they have, the user-to-printer ratio, spend on consumables like toner and the level of resources dedicated to support and maintenance.

Front office printers are important but not usually as mission critical as their back office industrial brothers. Which is why it’s all the more surprising how few enterprises have a real grasp on the age and reliability of each of their warehouse printer devices, what function each is doing and whether it’s right for the job, and any understanding of which of their machines is really mission critical in the logistics process.

In June 2015, Brother conducted some research into printer selection for retailers. It surveyed Computing subscribers in the retail industry and, when considering the value of print, said: In the general office world, printing tends to be a secondary requirement whereas in retail, it can often be a business-critical process calling for high levels of quality, reliability and manageability which no one printer or printer family can be expected to deliver.” And certainly retail would seem pretty unique in its diverse printing challenges, from issuing receipts from mobile devices at click and collect to churning out barcode tracking labels in hostile, often chilled operational environments. 

What was encouraging from Brother’s research, however, was that 64% of the respondents claimed to use MPS providers to minimise printer breakdowns so the value of outsourcing the management and maintenance of these vital machines seems to be getting through, at least to the retail space!

And certainly the real value of printing is something that the logistics business should understand, as few can afford the downtime of not being able to issue barcode labels, invoices, delivery notes or picking lists. Warehouse and distribution centre printers are the unsung heroes of the supply chain and when they’re inoperative, it not only impacts on getting goods out on the road but also affects business reputation and even risks the prospect of chargebacks.

MPS in front offices has become more widespread as organisations shift from capital expenditure to the more predictable operational expenses. It’s strange, therefore, that the concept of applying MPS to industrial warehouse printers, and the lower costs and reduced waste it would bring, seems to have bypassed logistics operators to any great extent thus far.

Maybe telling them to adopt a more Lean approach in 2016 is the way to go?