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Managing printing, signage, equipment, supplies, and service often starts simply.
You choose one company for commercial printing. Another provides your wide-format equipment. Someone else handles repairs. Supplies come from another source. When you need signs or displays, you call another vendor.
Each decision may make sense on its own. Over time, however, managing multiple vendors can create unnecessary complexity, inconsistent service, and costs that are easy to overlook.
For many organizations, consolidating business printing solutions with a trusted partner can simplify purchasing, improve communication, create greater consistency, and make it easier to get help when an unexpected need arises.
Here are seven hidden costs to consider when evaluating your current mix of print and equipment vendors.
1. Your Team Spends More Time Coordinating Vendors
Working with specialized vendors is not necessarily a problem.
The challenge comes when employees have to remember who handles what.
Who supplied the printer?
Who services it?
Where do you order ink and media?
Who printed the last set of presentation materials?
Who handles construction plans?
Can that same company produce signs for an upcoming event?
When those answers involve several different companies, even routine projects can require extra coordination.
Your employees may spend time searching through old emails, locating contact information, requesting quotes, explaining requirements, and following up with multiple companies.
Consolidating business printing solutions gives employees a clearer starting point when they need printing, equipment, supplies, or support.
2. Administrative Work Adds Up
Every vendor relationship requires some level of administration.
Your team may need to manage:
- Quotes
- Purchase orders
- Invoices
- Account information
- Vendor contacts
- Service agreements
- Supply orders
- Project specifications
- Delivery schedules
- Billing questions
None of these tasks seems particularly significant on its own.
Multiply them across several vendors, however, and the administrative burden can grow quickly.
The true cost of a vendor is not limited to the amount shown on an invoice. Employee time spent finding vendors, requesting estimates, tracking orders, approving invoices, resolving problems, and coordinating projects also has value.
A business printing solutions partner with multiple capabilities may help reduce some of those extra steps.
3. Separate Print and Equipment Vendors Can Create Workflow Gaps
Printing equipment is part of a larger workflow.
Your printer might come from one vendor while supplies, equipment service, large-format printing, and outsourced overflow work come from several others.
That can become a problem when needs overlap.
Imagine that an in-house wide-format printer goes down just before an important project deadline. Your team may suddenly need technical service, supplies, and outsourced printing at the same time.
If those services are spread across multiple vendors, employees may need to coordinate several calls while also trying to keep the project on schedule.
A partner that understands both your equipment and your printing needs may be able to help identify the most efficient way to keep work moving.
4. Inconsistent Print Quality Can Affect Your Brand
Your printed materials represent your organization.
When brochures come from one printer, signs from another, presentation materials from a third, and event graphics from someone else, maintaining consistency can become more difficult.
Differences may appear in:
- Color reproduction
- Paper and substrates
- Finishing
- Image quality
- File preparation
- Production standards
- Brand interpretation
For a one-time project, small differences may not matter.
For organizations producing marketing materials, sales collateral, signage, and other branded pieces throughout the year, consistency becomes much more important.
Working with fewer production partners gives those vendors an opportunity to become familiar with your brand standards, preferences, specifications, and expectations.
That familiarity can make future projects easier to produce consistently.
5. Equipment Downtime Can Become More Disruptive
Buying printing equipment is only one part of managing it.
You also need to consider what happens after installation.
Who will employees contact when something stops working?
How quickly can someone respond?
Does the service provider understand how important the equipment is to your workflow?
Can you quickly get the supplies and consumables you need?
What happens if production cannot wait for a repair?
These questions are particularly important for architecture, engineering, construction, and other organizations that rely heavily on large-format printing.
If your equipment provider, service company, supply source, and outsourced printing provider are all different, an equipment problem can quickly become a coordination problem.
The right business printing partner should understand both the equipment and the work that equipment supports.
That changes the conversation from simply fixing a machine to helping your business remain productive.
6. Complex Projects Require More Handoffs
Many business projects do not fit neatly into one service category.
Consider preparing for a trade show.
Your organization might need:
- Brochures
- Business cards
- Presentation folders
- Retractable banners
- Display graphics
- Signs
- Handouts
- Promotional materials
A construction project could require:
- Construction plan printing
- Large-format drawings
- Scanning
- Document management
- Jobsite signage
- Printing equipment
- Printing supplies
An office rebranding project might include commercial printing, wall graphics, signs, displays, and updated marketing collateral.
When one project involves several vendors, someone on your team becomes responsible for coordinating all of them.
That can mean multiple quotes, schedules, file transfers, proofs, deliveries, invoices, and conversations.
A partner with broader capabilities can reduce those handoffs and provide a more centralized approach to managing the project.
7. You Lose the Value of a Partner Who Knows Your Business
There is value in working with a company that already understands your organization.
Over time, a trusted print and equipment partner can become familiar with:
- Your brand standards
- Common print specifications
- Existing equipment
- Frequently ordered supplies
- Typical turnaround requirements
- Important contacts
- Recurring projects
- Delivery preferences
- Workflow challenges
That knowledge can reduce the amount of information your team needs to explain every time a new project begins.
It can also make it easier to identify opportunities to improve a process.
For example, a partner familiar with your organization might recognize that frequently outsourced work could be produced more efficiently in-house. In another situation, outsourcing a particular job may make more sense than investing in additional equipment.
Instead of treating every order as an isolated transaction, a long-term partner can understand the bigger picture.
Does Everything Need to Come From One Vendor?
Not necessarily.
There are situations where a specialized provider is the right choice. No single company needs to handle every project your organization will ever have.
The goal is not consolidation simply for the sake of having fewer vendors.
The better question is whether your current vendor structure is making work easier or harder.
Ask your team:
- How many vendors do we use for printing, equipment, supplies, and related services?
- How much time do employees spend coordinating those vendors?
- Are we satisfied with turnaround times?
- Are our printed materials consistent?
- Do we know exactly who to contact when equipment goes down?
- Are employees repeatedly searching for vendors for new projects?
- Do projects frequently require services from several different providers?
- Could some of these needs be handled more efficiently through one relationship?
If your team spends too much time managing the process, it may be worth considering a more integrated approach.
What to Look for in a Business Printing Solutions Partner
Before consolidating services with one company, make sure that partner can actually support the range of work your organization needs.
Depending on your business, useful capabilities may include:
- Commercial printing
- Large-format printing
- Signs and displays
- Construction document printing
- Online ordering
- Equipment sales
- Equipment service
- Printing supplies
- Scanning and document services
- Technical support
Capabilities are only part of the equation.
Look for a partner that takes time to understand how your organization works, responds when you need assistance, and recommends solutions based on the problem you are trying to solve.
The goal should be to make your workflow simpler, not simply move more purchases to another vendor.
How Integrated Business Printing Solutions Can Simplify Your Workflow
The biggest benefit of consolidating business printing solutions is not simply having fewer vendor names on a spreadsheet.
It is making work easier.
When your print partner understands your equipment, projects, brand, and workflow, your team has one place to start when a need arises.
That could mean producing a commercial print project, ordering supplies, servicing equipment, printing construction plans, creating signs and displays, or finding a solution for an unexpected project.
Fewer handoffs can mean simpler communication, better consistency, and less time spent coordinating vendors.
More Than Printing. Solutions That Keep Your Projects Moving.
For more than 60 years, Key Companies has helped organizations with printing, equipment, technology, and project support.
Our capabilities include commercial printing, large-format printing, signs and displays, construction document services, equipment, supplies, and technical support.
Whether you need help with a single project or are looking for a more efficient way to manage ongoing print and equipment needs, we can help you evaluate the options.
Contact Key Companies to discuss your printing, equipment, and workflow needs.
