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What do print buyers want? The list goes on. Cost, quality, added value and the environment clearly feature strongly on buyers' lists of demands, but can printers supply all of the above and more? And doesn't it just come down to price anyway?

Matthew Eglinton, commercial manager at Future Plus, the customer publishing arm of Future Publishing, says a lot of people in his company buy on price alone, but not him. It has got to be about service and an understanding of what we are trying to produce. I will actually decline from quoting for a job based purely on price. I don’t want to prove I can buy print well if I am always going to be restricted by the cost of jobs. This is a pointless exercise.

For Lisa Kendall, senior print buyer at charity Help the Aged, price is a key issue but there are other factors. As a charity, we have to buy cost-effectively and that is our main aim, she explains. But we don’t always go for the cheapest quote. If firms are more expensive but deliver a good service, they will still get some work.

Diana Levy, production manager for the Royal Horticultural Society agrees. Price is important, but if firms can’t provide the quality or the customer service then a low price will get them nowhere. I also run a mile from any company that is abnormally low in its pricing as it makes me feel very nervous.

The response should relieve some printers. As a printer, we need to get past the buying-on-price scenario in order to get the relationship going, says Tony Gardiner, sales director at Borcombe SP. If you have a good relationship with a print buyer, when they ask you to jump you know they need you to do it immediately.

Richard Owers, marketing director at Pureprint also thinks buyers must look past price in order to benefit from a productive relationship. Once you are secure in the relationship both companies can start exploring the bigger picture. But a buyer has to commit otherwise the printer is always running scared of the consequences, he says.

Jon Honeywill, creative director at Black Sun Corporate Reporting, buys print for a range of FTSE 100 companies. He says: We want four or five key suppliers that we can build long-term relationships with. When it comes to the crunch, these printers will help us make beneficial changes to jobs.

Innovation and value are at the top of print buyers’ wish lists. As print buyers, we all have a selection criteria, explains Jamie Overland, procurement director at TPF. Once a printer has been approved it is then about good relationships and building trust and reliability. If the printer is proactively involved, they can start adding value rather than simply delivering the basic specification. The differentiator becomes how well the printer produces your job and how responsive they are.

‘Fit for purpose’ should be one of a buyer’s catch cries. It is about understanding what we do and then offering a solution with a bit of innovation on top, says Eglinton. Kendall admits she gets frustrated when printers can’t offer her anything new. I think it is down to printers to push hard for work, she says.

A big challenge
Overland has quarterly review meetings with suppliers to discuss performance. We also talk about customers to find out what new technology or kit they have to offer our clients, he says. I would be impressed if a printer came to me, having looked at the clients we have, and showed me a mock-up. It would prove they had been proactive and had actually thought about what our business provides.

Although most printers are experienced and skilled enough to provide bucketloads of innovation, how good are they at communicating this to clients? The big challenge is that printers aren’t particularly good marketers, says Gardiner. The majority of us run very good businesses and we offer good services but we don’t tell anyone. It is getting that balance right. We don’t want to bombard buyers with information we think is important but they don’t, but we also don’t want to say too little, he adds. It is a very tricky situation.

Gardiner also argues it is difficult to actually get in front of print buyers to explain what kit the firm has and what it can do with it. Yet buyers argue that even when printers do manage to get their foot in the door, they are unable to clearly comm-unicate what they have on offer. Printers rattle off plant lists and expect you to know what you can do on each machine. Knowing the make and the model can sometimes mean nothing. I would rather know what it can print, says Levy.

Going the extra mile is most likely to impress buyers. It would actually be a lot easier if printers’ reps just did their homework before they called. They often don’t know who the print buyer is or what publications we do, says Levy. Kendall also questions the methods printers use to approach buyers. We rarely get a creative approach. It is normally a standard letter, she says. Eglinton agrees that printers must think carefully about their communication methods. I welcome good communication. I would rather have a 10-minute conversation with someone on the phone than be sent samples.

In response to this, however, printers argue that maybe it is the buyers that need to do their homework to fully understand how the print system works, rather than assume there is always a spare machine waiting to run their jobs. People think that we have presses or suppliers just waiting for us, says Eglinton. It is about educating our customers on the way the print industry works.

Although an experienced print buyer herself, Levy realises that some buyers, and buyers’ customers, lack an understanding of the industry. If you take someone to go and see a printing factory you can almost see when the light goes on in their eyes and they realise printers can’t turn a job around in 24 hours because it takes longer than that to print and longer than that to dry, explains Levy. Eglinton agrees: We have to make the sales guys understand what goes on in the print world.

Black Sun’s Honeywill says: For the last eight years the designers have been buying our print. They are the closest to the job and so they can spec it most effectively. Having a good understanding of how it is going to print should impact on a good design as well. But Kendall thinks only a professional print buyer is capable of procuring print efficiently. I think a professional does the job much better because they have the necessary knowledge.

Instead of just asking what print buyers want, perhaps the question should also be, is it possible? If a buyer is looking for rock-bottom prices, strong relationships and innovation in the same package then it seems not. There needs to be some give and take in the relationship between buyers and printers. Each could learn a lot from the other. Buyers must work with printers to get all their boxes ticked. Sharing the vast array of knowledge from both camps will pay dividends, in cost, quality and all-round job satisfaction.