Smart Print Manufacturing: MultiPress MIS/ERP shows your print media company a better way forward
27 October 2022
The love-hate relationship between print media companies and their print MIS/ERP solution is a complex story. MIS/ERP solutions for print media companies should be the sole source of truth for the company; the solution should support every function and every employee in the company. The reality is often a little less rosy: implementing a print MIS/ERP solution into existing workflows requires a lot of dedication and time, assuming internal resistance does not derail the whole project. But make that effort succeed and your print media business will run better than ever.
Sustainable and end-to-end transformation
Print companies usually start by implementing core modules, such as estimation, quote management, order creation and accounting. For a small to medium-sized print company, implementation often takes only a few months; for larger companies, the process sometimes takes more than a year. After the core MIS/ERP system is installed and operational, a smaller group of companies goes on to implement more advanced modules for production control and registration, inventory management, fulfilment and customer management. A final, even smaller group moves on to planning and business intelligence modules that can actually have the biggest impact on your profits and the control you have over your print media business. So the whole of this implementation process is a big investment that you don't jump into overnight.
So now that you know the inherent challenges and the implementation process, why would you want a print MIS/ERP solution? The answer: sustainable and wide-ranging transformation. When done right, an MIS/ERP system can provide real and increasingly real-time data to help operators, production supervisors, management and owners make the right decisions at the right time. Instead of experience, intuition or guesswork, a fully implemented print MIS/ERP has the exact data to answer key business questions at any time, such as:
- Who are my biggest customers and what percentage of total sales do they represent?
- Who are my most profitable customers and products/services?
- What is my production capacity at any given time and will I be able to meet peak demand?
- Who are my most successful salespeople? What type of work and what margins are they booking?
Smart Print Manufacturing
So achieving that advanced use of your MIS/ERP solution is actually the goal, provided it works with your other software to take your print media business to the next level: Smart Print Manufacturing.
Smart Print Manufacturing starts with streamlining inputs (customers, job onboarding, and production assets) to optimise each stage of production, eliminate or minimise production inefficiencies and errors while maximising uptime and production. Your print MIS/ERP solution should have both upstream and downstream reach to coordinate and record production processes, as it should be the most reliable source of truth within your print media business:
- Can it receive orders online (via a module or third-party solution) and give the customer real-time, cost-based pricing?
- Can the order ticket, with all the client's intentions, travel into your prepress workflow along with the supplied artwork?
- Can material usage be optimised through intelligent scheduling and job grouping?
- Can it receive milestone updates from downstream software and equipment to update the job ticket and scheduling, while also triggering alerts and notifications?
If the answer to these questions is yes, then you will notice that your print MIS/ERP system actually behaves more like a management and workflow platform for your print media business. That's exactly how Dataline designed MultiPress. The high-quality MIS/ERP software MultiPress was developed specifically to meet the needs of modern print media companies of all sizes and production technologies. In addition to the core and advanced modules described above, MultiPress has certified integrations with other leading software from the likes of Agfa, Enfocus, Kodak, XMPie and many others to pass relevant production information upstream and downstream.
Love it or hate it, print media companies need tools that enable sustainable and comprehensive change. Smart Print Manufacturing is the next evolution in print production and many are already well on their way. What are you waiting for?