Your Office Can Go Green With a Managed Print Service Partnership!

Print and paper habits within the business world have a significant effect on the environment. According to the EPA, the average employee uses 10,000 paper sheets annually. Add that up nationwide, and you’re looking at around 40 million tons of paper pages used every year! That’s a staggering number that reflects both productivity—and massive amounts of waste.

Thankfully, more organizations are searching for new ways to be environmentally conscious while still getting the job done. Even as the world becomes increasingly digital, paper use will remain integral to the modern workplace for years to come.

So while paper reigns supreme, how can businesses become more green and sustainable while remaining efficient?

One way is to partner with a managed print service, also called an MPS. Managed print can help businesses create a smarter print environment in countless ways with strategies to go green at the forefront. Here are a few ways that a managed print service can build a more eco-friendly office:

How Green Is Your Office Now?

Before building a greener, eco-friendly future for your business, you have to know where you currently stand. An MPS Analytics team can come on-site and perform a walkthrough of your current print environment state.

During the analysis, they’ll carefully examine your print set-up from how much paper you use to which devices demand the most energy. They’ll also investigate your total print, scan, fax operations, including a full study on how your current workflow affects the environment. For example, they’ll consider factors like:

• • Current Consumable Output
    

    Using a special device, the Analytics team will precisely count how many print jobs your printers, copiers, fax machines, etc. produce daily, monthly, and annually. This includes paper, toner, and other consumables.

• Overall Energy Usage

  Learn exactly how much energy is produced when your various print devices are both in Standby and Operating mode. It’s not just the high amount of energy emitted from the busiest printers that surprise businesses—infrequently used machines put out a significant wattage as well.

• Other Essential Data and Assumptions

  Other data, as well as assumptions about your typical print habits, are also collected. This usually includes toner coverage on a mono or color page, daily and weekly working hours of a print device, electricity cost, and standby power percentage. Each of these data points can signal the eco-friendliness of an office.

After performing the walkthrough, the Analytics team will present all of the data to you—and this data means everything! From this information, the team will develop your Green Analysis, which is today’s picture of your current state.

After presenting your current Green Analysis, the print management company will recommend a future Green state. These recommendations can include everything from rightsizing your printer fleet, so you waste less power to updating your current devices with newer, EnergyStar efficient models. This upgrade alone can save the planet on CO2 emissions and electricity!

Here is a real example of a current Green Analysis state we analyzed for a client in 2019. The prospect initially had a total of 77 devices spread over four buildings.

• The total power consumption was 10,725 kilowatts per year
• The total CO2 emission was 9,281 kilograms per year
• The total electricity cost was $857.99
• The total number of trees consumed annually was 101

Now, here’s the future Green state recommendation where we suggested rightsizing their fleet down to 58 devices:

• The total power consumption estimated at 4,247 kilowatts per year
• The total CO2 emission estimated at 4,263 kilograms per year
• The total electricity cost estimated at $339.75
• The total number of trees consumed annually estimated at 56

These changes alone would significantly impact the company’s bottom line and increase their office’s sustainability.

Eco-Friendly Print Programs & Software

An MPS can also suggest, install, and implement innovative software, tools and programs like PrintReleaf, one of our partners at imageOne. PrintReleaf is a fantastic company and service that offers a reforestation program for every page printed. For a certain number of pages printed at your business, PrintReleaf plants a tree.

Since May 2016, imageOne has offset 50 million pages and planted 6,005 trees in eight countries. Each client will receive access to their company’s reforestation efforts so you can see exactly what kind of difference you’re making. Another neat feature is the ability for businesses to decide where those trees are planted. You’ll also get a monthly PDF showcasing all of this information so you can see your organization’s efforts in going green.

Software to Boost Eco-Friendly Habits

Green initiatives and aspirations to go paperless at the office are awesome. But in reality, carrying out these measures are never one and done. A plan to instill sustainable, eco-friendly strategies must be continuous and multifaceted.

PaperCut is software that gives you complete visibility and control of your print environment. After implementing PaperCut, most users report print cost savings of 20-30%! It also eliminates up to 12% of unclaimed print jobs.

These reductions are great not just for your bottom line. They also go hand-in-hand with making your operation eco-friendly. That’s because a massive perk of PaperCut are its features that support your team in making greener decisions such as:

• Responsible Reminders: Friendly pop-ups will implement better print policies by prompting users to print in duplex or grayscale for specific jobs.
• Stop Uncollected Print Jobs: How often have you walked past a printer and seen a pile of abandoned print outs? With PaperCut’s secure print release, you’ll ensure that only the jobs you need are printed.
• Actionable Reports: Get full print visibility to unlock in-depth insights and stats like—how many trees worth of paper have you used while printing this week?

In addition to comprehensive reports, PaperCut gives you an environmental dashboard that illustrates the number of trees saved, CO2 output, and energy expenditures. Though print is essential at a certain volume, this will help you reduce your overall impact.

These are just a few of the countless ways that a managed print service can support your company in implementing strategies that are better for your budget, your productivity, and for the world.

If your business is ready to go green, partner with the friendly, reliable expert team at imageOne. With us, you’ll never be alone as your office transforms into a genuinely Earth-friendly organization. Reach out today to schedule a free, no-obligation 15-minute consultation, and let’s start designing a more sustainable workplace.

Print and paper habits within the business world have a significant effect on the environment. Connect with me on Twitter and LinkedIn and keep up with my company imageOne. Check out my website or some of my other work here.

*Co-authored by Kristy Swope, Software Solutions Manager at imageOne