Saving Money on Stationery
Like every other business in the world you will be looking at saving money on stationery. Particularly if you are a small business and feel you can eek out a few pennies by printing your own letterheads with your invoices etc, especially in this (current) lockdown situation we all find ourselves in. With the threat of a second wave seemingly imminent if you believe the media. Well, Im here to buck the trend and tell you that simply does not make sense at any level. Firstly, I do accept your need for stationery these days is far less than it ever used to be, but it will make financial and business sense to, but professionally. Here is the reason why. I crunched some numbers for you yesterday. This is what I found: (we are assuming standard buying and of course people are using an inkjet printer, which the majority of small/home businesses are (that is another story and let me tell you, you should get on the laser train as soon as possible)
Standard (and by standard I mean cheap) A4 80gsm paper, and sometimes it isnt even inkjet compatible and the ink bleeds into the paper £4.50 per 500 (also called a ream)
Inkjet toners per colour (av yield of 500 @10% coverage) £10 so you would need 4 @£40
Total £44.50 per 500 pages
At nearly 9p/page and not allowing for the content of the letter itself that is quite high a price, the only benefit is that you are spreading the cost over a longish term, the costs of course rise if your heads dry in the inkjet and you have to replace them quicker.
If you went for a premium 100gsm paper, that’s a heavier weight, more luxurious feel and had 1000 (at time of writing) that would be £65 plus VAT delivered, that is approx 7p/page for double the quantity. To improve this cost, you could go back and increase the quantity and get bigger benefits, for instance 5000@£135 yielding approx 3p/page and so on. The cost benefits are significant, if you have the requirement, for much larger quantities. The advice here is to buy professional and don’t make do, ultimately you will get a better looking product for far less money. Don’t forget to ask for blank continuation sheets at the same time. For those who don’t know its the same material as your letterhead with no printing (usually) so that you can continue with your letters onto multiple pages.
Of course I am in print and I would love to handle your work, this is about you doing the numbers, and taking a bit of advice and making informed decisions. When it comes to making informed decisions, I offer you these thoughts:
Business Cards, unless you are a sales person out all the time, are a waste of time, people do not bother to study a business card, and we make the mistake of buying loads in one go that never get used. My advice, lower the quantity dramatically and up the quality. Get noticed with the high standard and feel, really make an impression, if it is about getting your details over send a digital VCard with all your details.
Envelopes are another area to make an impression, both on bulk buying professionally and showing who you are before opening, whilst we are on it, if it is applicable think about packaging. If you doubt this, just think about the pleasure of opening your new Iphone each time. That is a great example of setting out your business and standards.
Folders, you have to love a folder, glued or interlocking, capacity or not, business card slots or not. So many options, but here is a thought, you could get away with folding a letterhead with the header visible and using that with a paperclip to hold your bundle of papers. Think about what you actually need instead of what you are led into buying. I love seeing people when they tell me they got a great price on letterheads etc and bought something that was mostly useless to their actual needs.
If you want to discuss it and see if you could do things differently Im happy to get into a discussion with you and maybe help longer term in your business. Good luck!
