While we live in an
age where we tend to have a number of paper free options for reading things and
showing them to people, sometimes only a hard copy will do. While most
companies and individuals have already dramatically reduced the amount they
print compared with 15 or even five years ago, due to things like electronic
cloud based document archives and document viewing facilities on smartphones
and tablets, printing can still be a substantial overhead for many people.
Additionally, of course, where resources get used, there is an environmental
cost, even when you print on sustainable, recycled paper.
Why Consider Greener Printing?
With many customers
now very concerned about the green credentials of the companies they choose to
give their money to, anything you do that can improve your ability to say you
are an environmentally friendly business is a good thing. More than that
though, when it comes to printing, choosing the greener options is actually
cheaper. Printing supplies are necessary, but as well as getting a good deal on
them by sourcing them from a company likeusaprinterguy.com who offer good value, you also need to make sure you aren't wasting anything.
Change Company Policy to Print More
Economically
If you want to save significant amounts of money on
printing and you want
to seriously change the impact your business' printing has on the environment,
you need to make changes to your policies and make sure all staff are aware of
them. Of course, there will always be times when it makes sense to print on the
highest quality paper in full, glorious color (for instance if you are printing
something to give to a prospective client at a sales pitch), so staff should be
allowed to use their discretion, but good, clear printing policies that make
sense to everybody can be set and distributed to encourage people within the
business to change their default behaviors.
Policies to Consider
Here are some ideas
for a cheaper, greener printing policy for your business:
· Some fonts are designed to use far
less ink than others.
Consider using these as standard fonts for corporate documents, and include
this within your company style guide.
· Default settings for internal printouts (i.e.
those not shown to clients) should be in grayscale, draft quality, with two
pages per side of paper.
· All printing (including higher quality prints
for customers) should be double sided.
· If MS Office is used, staff should be reminded
of the 'Shrink To Fit' and 'Reduce by One Page' features for documents and
spreadsheets.
· Toner cartridges should be replaced when print
quality starts to deteriorate, rather than when the printer warns that toner is
low.
Implementing these policies should not be too
difficult. You can distribute a memo by email, post the guidelines on the
company intranet or other staff network, and include the printing policies with
your other IT use policies in the induction materials you give to new people
joining the company.