MPS – A New Cost Saving Acronym For The SMB Vocabulary

By Mark Duffelen, director and general manager, Channels Group, Xerox UK and Ireland

Do you run a small or medium size business? I used to, and I can tell you, cost management was something that was constantly on my mind.MPS – A New Cost Saving Acronym For The SMB Vocabulary

Now, more than ever, the welfare of the European economy is intrinsically linked to the strength of small and medium size businesses. In the enlarged European Union of 27 countries, some 23 million SMBs provide around 75 million jobs – that’s about two out of every three private sector jobs –  and contribute more than half (58 percent) the total value added created by private businesses in the European Union [1].

Xerox’s European Channels Group, and its network of channel partners (including multi-brand resellers and concessionaires), is constantly on the lookout for opportunities to support these vital enterprises and reduce their costs. One such opportunity that an increasing number of SMBs are taking is the implementation of a managed print service (MPS).

The key challenge appears to be sourcing the most efficient hardware and running the best processes, all for the lowest available costs. With businesses typically adding more, not less, equipment to meet growing demand, can this aim actually be achieved? Many SMBs might think not, but then according to a recent Quocirca survey, 50 percent of them have not even heard of MPS.

Until recently, MPS was seen predominantly as a large enterprise offering. But with 60 percent of SMBs and mid-market organisations currently purchasing printer hardware and consumables on a transactional basis, the opportunity is very clear for smaller organisations to reap the benefits too.

By deploying a strategy of controlling where and how documents are printed, MPS can save up to 30 percent of operating costs.

So if cost reduction is one of your headaches, perhaps it’s time MPS entered your business vocabulary.

 

 

Related Posts

2 Comments

  1. Joel B April 6, 2013 -

    I believe that many businesses grow to a point that they lose control over, or simply don’t quite know how to calculate their printing expenses. I worked for a printer manufacturer for several years, that also had a division providing MPS and they had a hard time understanding their own printing costs. Each department within the company purchased and deployed their own hardware, and many people had small inkjet devices in their offices. As often was the case, different departments, having different hardware platforms had to source their own consumables. This was very costly (no bulk purchasing power) and labor intensive. The people buying the supplies were typically departmental administrators, and reducing costs were not a priority.
    MPS makes sense, and has been a proven business model for many large enterprises, some of which print monthly volumes in the millions of pages, in multiple locations. SMB should certainly benefit from MPS, maybe not in the high percentage of savings that is claimed, but by having a better, more efficient process that enables their few employees to better utilize their time.
    There are a lot of companies providing MPS today, most of the printer manufacturers were the first to offer the service, as well as some of the hardware dealers. Companies like Office Depot and Staples now offer MPS with (I think) has some added value in that they are mostly hardware ‘agnostic’, (or so they say), and the end user can benefit from their retail print offering through the thousands of local print facilities. In essence they can provide a ‘virtual print center’ that can produce documents requiring higher quality on different medias, more complex finishing and even large format.

  2. short url May 9, 2015 -

    Everything is very open with a clear clarification of tthe challenges.
    It wass really informative. Your site is extremely helpful.
    Manny thanks for sharing!

Comments are closed.