Fremont, Calif. – Electronics For Imaging, Inc. today announced that The Print Source, Inc. has chosen the EFI™ Enterprise Commercial Print Suite business and production workflow that improves efficiency and optimizes and streamlines manufacturing – all while providing the Wichita, Kansas-based company with greater business insights. The Suite utilizes iQuote, an advanced, highly efficient estimating and planning system, combined with sophisticated PrintFlow® scheduling. And, an Auto-Count® automated data collection component in The Print Source’s Suite provides the company with a new level of automation and production visibility.

The 100-employee, family-owned business offers a diverse selection of screen, offset, and digital print-related services ranging from letterhead to metal placards for aircraft. As The Print Source’s Marketing Manager, Jason Rowe, explained, “If it sits down long enough, we’ll print on it!”

Positioned for the future

The new workflow Suite helps The Print Source continue growing in its versatility. “Years ago,” said Rowe, “we started with a Covalent product and eventually migrated to a proprietary system built on SAS. Our system became difficult to maintain, and we didn’t put things in until they were needed. Once we saw EFI’s estimating, scheduling, invoicing, shipping, and online ordering capabilities, we realized how much we were missing."

The Print Source chose the EFI Enterprise Commercial Print Suite to help grow business rather than to reduce costs. "There is plenty of local opportunity in the state of Kansas, and we also want to reach anyone, anywhere with our services,” said Rowe. “However, it is essential to maintain our quality during growth, and we need efficiency, cost-competitiveness, and accuracy to make that happen.

“Every order used to start from ground zero, and it was difficult to know whether we were estimating the best approach. Now, orders begin with a running start. It is fast and easy to quickly identify if we’re going down the wrong path and make adjustments. EFI allows us to stop looking in the rear-view mirror with the foresight to see what is going on.”

An end-to-end solution

The Print Source chose to implement a full host of Suite components – eCRM, iQuote/iPlan, Monarch™ Foundation, PrintFlow, Process Shipper, and MarketDirect StoreFront – all at once rather than to gradually add components over time. Rowe explained the company’s rationale for this challenging route: "We decided to go all-in because it's a cultural thing which affects every single person in the organization and gives us more visibility all the time. We felt that a piecemeal implementation would lengthen the time before we began seeing results. So, we started implementation back in January and were fully functional by mid-July.

“We still have more work to do but are now dealing with minutia. After only one month there was less tension and people understood that this was a good thing. They come to work, do their jobs, and don’t have to worry about surprises or hidden issues.

“This approach works for us because we are such a tight-knit, family-owned environment,” Rowe continued. “Our staff knows that we aren’t doing this to cut budgets or to let people go. We have everyone’s buy-in because we allow them to make mistakes without pointing fingers. This system allows us to route employees to be more effective and better at their jobs.”

Printing and packaging professionals across the globe rely on EFI's portfolio of workflow products to manage their businesses and become more streamlined, efficient, informed, and profitable. For more information, visit www.efi.com or contact 800-875-7117.