Top Five Reasons Your Business Still Needs Office Printers

It’s 2024, and you’re convinced that having office printers at your business is completely a thing of the past. Why would you or any of your employees even need office printers, especially since your business has gone “paperless”?

There’s nothing wrong with going paperless. In fact, it’s a great way to store your documents on your online server while also helping out the environment. Especially, when using office multifunction printers (MFPs). Not to mention how much easier it is to share and edit documents online without having to manually scan them yourself.

However, being a completely paperless business might not be as beneficial as you may think. Even in this fast-paced digital age we are living in, office printers and hard copies are absolutely still necessary for the success of your business.

In order to have a well-rounded, multi-faceted business, it’s important you continue to incorporate both printed and online materials in your business plans.

Here we list our top five reasons why we think it’s imperative to still have office printers at your business… we think you’ll agree!

1. You’re Paperless, But Are Your Customers?

Just because your office might be paperless does not mean all businesses and customers are on board yet with you. Your business structure is, of course, different from any other businesses out there, and the total elimination of office printers might not work for them like it does for you.

We’ll give you an example: Say you’re an office supplies company and is responsible for providing your clients with invoices on the products they’ve purchased each month. Since your company is digitally-based and paperless, you deliver your clients’ invoices online, via PDF.

A problem soon erupts with this process because one of your clients is a very small “mom and pop” company who rarely ever uses a computer, let alone even has the required program to read pdf files. They won’t be able to view their invoice, leaving not just them inconvenienced, but you as well.

This will make it harder for them to receive their bill, and make it even harder for you to receive their payment. It’s all about you providing customers with more options for you to communicate and the ease of doing business with them. Do you want them to feel “included” or “excluded”?

Now, we know not all companies are like this nowadays, but you get the idea. Hence, this is why it's important your office has the ability to print hard copies for those clients who need documents in physical form.

As a business, it looks great to be able to give your customers options, such as receiving their invoices via digital or print. Let them make the call on how you can best service them.

If you are in the market to purchase a new office printer but not sure which one to go with, check out our article on, Sharp Copiers vs. Kyocera Copiers: Which is Better?

2. Technological Issues: Hard Copies Can Survive

Let’s face it, you don’t need us to tell you that computers sometimes crash for reasons we may never be able to prevent. In worst-case scenarios, your company’s personal data, documents, and spreadsheets can be lost permanently, leaving you scrambled and most likely, prolonging the completion of important projects.

Now, we’re not saying you have to keep hard copies of every single document your company produces, that would be extreme and unnecessary. But what we are saying is to keep hard copies of personal and important company data that you cannot afford to lose. Use your office printers to print important documents, such as accounting documents, employee information, and company policies.

Even keeping hard copies of your yearly marketing and sales plans or goals is a smart idea that ensures if something ever does go wrong with the technology at your company, these important documents won’t be hard to recover.

While technology has improved the business world so much, there will still never be any more foolproof method for record keeping than paper documents stored in a safe place. Still not convinced in this area, then you may want to consider backing up all of your stored data or a disaster recovery plan.

3. The Power of Physically Holding Something

This reason is actually pretty simple… sometimes people just like to have something to hold. Especially, your employees.

Depending on the type of person you are, it is easier for some people to work off of a document that they can physically touch and markup, as opposed to looking at it off of their computer screen. There really is something to be said about being able to highlight and handwrite notes on a document.

Being able to provide your employees with the option to work off of a physical piece of paper, printed from your office printer, could potentially increase the work productivity in your office.

Or, say you are running a meeting where you are presenting a new project you’d like your team to take on. Along with your powerpoint presentation, you provide your team with a small paper packet of the points you’ll be going over.

This helps keep your team members engaged with what you’re saying along with making it easy for them to make notes directly on the pages as ideas come to their mind. It’s a great way to retain audience engagement and interaction throughout your presentation!

4. You’ve Got Real Mail

There’s certainly been a trend of purging all printed materials that used to make their way to our home and business mailboxes. Before the internet completely took off, our mailboxes were becoming flooded with ads and mailers that we would typically skim over and then toss in the trash.

However, it seems we went from one extreme to another: receiving too much mail to receiving none at all. It still feels good to get something in the mail, addressed specifically just for you, even if it’s only once in a while.

Sending out small mailers or coupons to your customers in the mail is a great way to show your dedication to them as well as making them feel appreciated and special. Even adding a short, personalized message can make all the difference that will sustain and grow the relationship between you and your customers.

5. Don’t Limit Yourself: Reach As Many Businesses As You Can

This last reason why office printers are important for your business is probably the most important as it wraps up the four reasons above. If your business has gone paperless and completely gotten rid of all office printers...

You’re limiting the success of your business.

Don’t you want to make sure your business products and services are reaching the GREATEST amount of people? To do so, you can’t limit your advertising and promotional pieces to online markets only.

Incorporating and distributing physical print materials (such as brochures and pamphlets) is one of the easiest ways to directly connect someone to your online efforts. Seeing your business in print will lead them to look you up further, online.

Since we currently are so wrapped up in digital efforts, cross-marketing physical pieces of paper is a really great strategy when trying to gain a better and stronger following.

Still unsure about the benefits of using an office printer? Maybe this article, 5 Reasons Print is Still Necessary in the Digital Age, will help you understand our reasons even more.