Car dealer gets behind the wheel of a new printing solution

Further, management of the printers themselves is made much easier by the fact that they can be connected to the internet and receive patches or other software immediately without the need for expensive maintenance visits.

As the Fuji Xerox products have web browsing capabilities, the status of each printer -- from paper levels, toner, errors etc. -- can be detected online simply by typing in its IP address. "Once they are set up they definitely run themselves -- there’s no maintenance that needs to be involved. You get an instant fix and your downtime is fairly minimal," Logan says.

Naturally this is of great importance to Solution Printing.

"Servicing is done mostly via the phone -- before the internet there were more onsite calls -- now we do it online," Solution Printing managing director Sue Bailey says, adding that this has led to software playing a more important role in printing generally.

Crucially for the client, however, being able to quickly identify and fix problems can play a big role in raising customer service levels.

"Redundancy is very important," Bailey adds. "If a customer is waiting and can’t get their invoice they’d be pretty cheesed. Etheridge staff can now print to anything."

In an effort to further contain spending on consumables, Logan decided to buy only black printers, choosing to have colour logos and other graphics preprinted on paper and stationery.

"Having black laser printers and A4 paper pre-printed with colour worked out to be cheaper than the way we were doing things. To me that was pretty surprising."

The challenge for Solution Printing, aside from the fact that it had no previous dealings with the auto industry, was helping Etheridge identify what needed to go while also taking on the role of sprucing up the company’s image. In Etheridge Ford’s case they were using all this hard-to-use pre-printed stationery, Bailey says. "We went in and made the right changes -- the cost savings alone were enormous."

The other obstacle facing Solution Printing -- and one that is common in the auto industry -- was carefully navigating around Etheridge’s proprietary systems so as to not cause too much disruption to existing processes and ideas.

"It makes it hard for an outsider to come and say we can help you without integrating with existing proprietary systems," Bailey says.

Solution Printing provided software from Paris Printing Solutions for which it is the exclusive southern regional distributor. This solution integrates with parts of the original application from Reynolds and Reynolds. "For the past 15 years all dealers have been utilising the old dot-matrix style of printing, which not only cost a fortune in ribbons and parts, but also in pre-printed forms which were often three-part," Logan says.

Solution Printing's Bailey: Software is playing a more important role in printing generally

"This meant a great deal of wear and tear on the printer as it had to print high volumes whilst pulling through up to 240 gsm paper."

What really clinched the deal for Solutions Printing in Logan’s view was the heavy solutions flavour of their offering, strong support from Fuji Xerox and the fact that both companies understood both the industry that Etheridge is in as well as the company’s particular nuances.

As Bailey says, there is a tendency in the channel for companies to simply dump the hardware and/or software and basically leave. "We find a lot of distributors out there don’t sell a service or a solution -- they sell the hardware and walk away, or they just sell the software and walk away."

A long-time channel partner of Fuji Xerox, Bailey believes that key to her company’s success over the past 10 years has been its attention to its customers’ special needs.

Logan says that he and Etheridge were swayed by the amount of thought and energy Solution Printing put into its pitch.

The solution involved revamping the company’s parts, service and administration departments to print on laser printers, allowing staff to not only print out forms as normal, but with previously undreamt additional functions such as using the printers to print emails and other documents.

It was clearly the right solution and, importantly, it meant major cost savings. But taking it further, Logan says, "Fuji Xerox met with us on a number of occasions, and even went as far to introduce someone from the head office in Sydney". That’s service for you.