01732 759725 40 VOX POP continued... PrintIT Reseller: Almost three-quarters (70%) of channel partners polled by Quocirca said they expect print volumes to continue falling by an average of 6.25% this year. To what extent has this decline impacted your business? Quocirca recently published the results of its State of the Channel Survey 2024 (page 34), here, PrintIT Reseller invited some of the industry’s channel businesses to comment on some of the findings Declining print volumes Simon Riley, Director, Vitale Digital: I understand this from the point of view from the long-established partners and we do see a trend of people purchasing fewer devices due to hybrid working and lower volumes being produced. A customer who had ten machines may now reduce the fleet by 30% but increase the volume capacity of the new machines to cope with spikes in volume. However, to counter that as a newer business, everything we do is growth, we actually only see our print volume increasing month by month. Ryan Green, Digital Services Director, Carbon: We’ve observed a corresponding decrease in demand for traditional printing services. This shift has prompted us to adapt by diversifying our offerings and investing in more balanced sustainable print and digital solutions to meet the evolving needs of our clients. While the reduction in print volumes presents challenges, it also opens up opportunities for innovation and growth in new areas. Janet Bowden, Managing Director, Woodbank Office Solutions: The decline in print volumes has definitely impacted our business over the last few years, but we have always tried to follow the lead of our global partners, forecast potential trends and evolve proactively, as opposed to reacting. In the last five years, we’ve significantly shifted our focus towards diversifying our offer. In addition to our extensive portfolio of printers, we actively promote and provide digital and secure, cloud-based products, and additional services such as scanning and digital archiving. We’re fortunate in that we have great working relationships with all our technology partners, working alongside them to stay ahead of industry trends. This means, we are very forward thinking as a business, able to provide new solutions and add value for our customers. For example, many businesses today want to adopt greener policies throughout their business, which includes limiting print and the use of physical documents. By analysing which industries are leading the way in moving to greener business solutions, we have been able to strategically focus our efforts on 1) Facilitating that progression for our customers and 2) Delivering the best quality and cost-effective solutions to those sectors that still need to generate higher print volumes. John Green, Managing Director, Commerce Business Systems: Managed print has always been our core business and so far, we are not really seeing a big decline in print yet, in fact, we’re seeing growth in the area of mid to higher volume MFPs. We are not resting on our laurels though; even though we are seeing an increase in our business, print is now only part of what we offer. We are constantly adapting to the requirements of the market to provide additional services and that is what we are building on, alongside the managed print business. Jon Palin, Technical Director, Elmdale Maintenance: We have not really seen a decline in print requirements. Many of our customers are schools and, in the majority of cases, schools have actually increased their print volumes over the last year. However, what we have found is a small decline in revenue, when contracts are due for renewal at some schools, who openly admit to obtaining up to ten quotes and taking the cheapest one offered; which may leave them under supported in the area Simon Riley
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