Managed Print Case Study:
GWA Group
"The best project rollout we've had in a long time."
GWA escaped an inflexible contract, cut their print fleet in half and reduced their print spend by 67% with help from Enabl.
The GWA story
GWA is a leading Australian supplier of bathroom and kitchen fixtures. With brands including Caroma, Methven, Dorf and Clark, if you’ve looked around a bathroom lately, you probably spotted a few of their products. GWA have offices in Australia, New Zealand and the UK, and operates a number of showrooms across Australia.
The challenge
In 2021, GWA became concerned that previous suppliers had oversold them, had multiple active contracts, and their print service was costing far too much with an excessive number of printers under contract. In August, GWA connected with Enabl to help audit their current print solution and contracts.
GWA had attempted to return some of their printers to their supplier and re-negotiate their costs and terms, but the supplier refused to make any changes, forcing GWA to keep paying for printers that they weren’t using. This inflexibility meant that GWA was stuck in a costly contract.
They had 148 printers, with shared devices plus dedicated devices in many private offices, and most devices were extremely underutilised.
Toner was slow to arrive and always running out. Rollouts of any new devices saw little involvement from the supplier and GWA had to pick up the slack, with their IT team bearing this burden. GWA was also paying for a swipe-to-release solution that didn’t work.
Most pressing of all was their warehouse printers. When these went down or ran out of toner, getting orders out to customers became a real challenge. GWA couldn’t print packing slips or delivery orders for outgoing orders. This had become a frequent occurrence that was impacting their business operations.
A simplified solution
Enabl created a managed print solution for GWA focussed on consolidation and uptime. A successful pilot site implementation gave GWA the confidence to give Enabl the green light for the complete rollout.
We deployed 60 new devices to their Australia and New Zealand sites. We standardised the fleet to 6 models that utilised the same toner supplies, ensuring that there would always be ample toner availability. Each model was picked to match the use case of each site, with high-volume machines equipped with additional features, and mono devices used in sites that didn’t require colour, like the GWA warehouse.
To guarantee printer uptime at GWA's warehouse locations, we:
- Standardised models – uniform toner supplies
- Set up direct printing – staff can easily divert to another printer as needed
- Enhanced the toner automation – toner re-supplies ship sooner and extras are stored on site
Great things happened
After the switch to Enabl for their print management, GWA reduced their print spend by 67% and cut the number of printers at GWA in half. They’re now using a right-sized print solution that matches their needs.
Enabl’s swipe-to-release solution was installed across office and showroom locations. “Ghost prints” (those left unclaimed on the printer) have been reduced, and staff can easily print to any device whilst ensuring their document stays confidential.
“The best project rollout we’ve experienced in a long time”.
GWA’s experience with Enabl’s project manager prompted this comment on the fully managed rollout process. All 60 devices were rolled out successfully over 30 days, ensuring no downtime in the warehouse or interruption to any staff. Enabl coordinated the return or disposal of old devices and ensured previous contracts were terminated.
Enabl’s managed service and automated delivery of toner supplies, has saved GWA’s IT team 12 hours per month.
Most importantly, GWA now has a partner that listens to their needs and offers the flexibility to adapt the solution to their changing business.
“Enabl taking over our print management has been very successful. The smooth roll-out and great service is a testament to how hard the Enabl team have worked. From my perspective, what was promised and what was delivered is a perfect match – the team have delivered a solution that works for us.”
Ryan Clarke
Head of Technology Operations | GWA