‘Green’ bows to price as recession drives printing trends

The recession has pushed ‘green’ concepts such as energy efficiency and the paperless office to the side as businesses base printing decisions around price, says Daryl Rickwood, HP New Zealand Country Manager, Image and Printing Group.

The recession has been hard on most New Zealand companies, but the common lesson most businesses have learnt is how to cut back on costs, he says – especially with printing.

“Energy efficiency hasn’t played a part,” he says. “What we have seen over the recession is that price is the leader.”

This is not only down to cost-cutting in business, but also due to increased competition in the printing market, says Rickwood.

“Other vendors have been quite aggressive, so price has definitely been at the forefront of it.”

Although the economy is showing signs of recovery, Rickwood believes the impact of the global financial crisis will help keep price as the key driver in the printing industry.

“Price will always be there. I think what businesses have learnt during the recession is that they need to look at internal costs, so what you will see is a shift from businesses – from small, medium and through to big businesses – looking at how to reduce their costs through printers.”

To combat the effects of the recession on the printing industry, Rickwood says HP has looked at ways to provide the end-user with better service.

This has been achieved by placing an increased emphasis on managed print services through the establishment of a specialist team, designed to work with the client to provide tailored solutions.

Rickwood says other areas HP look to help end-users save is through printer consolidation or fleet deployment.

But regardless of price, Rickwood says people are generally printing more – a trend he believes will continue into 2010.

What businesses are doing is looking at ways to print differently – such as controlling the environment of printing and the use of colour to keep costs down.