We had an established Business Information Services center dedicated to print and mail in Cleveland, Ohio. The facility handles printing and mailing for large enterprises just like the retailer. However, we suggested altering the retailer's established workflow to reduce print and mail costs.
We showed the retailer the benefits of eliminating steps, using a standardized envelope with a larger window and adding a cover letter. With this standardized envelope, more information could be printed on the cover letter and revealed through the enlarged window — eliminating the need to print on the envelope. We persuaded the retailer to abandon color printing on its envelopes and invoices as this information isn't a marketing tool that needs to stand out. We continued their established process of householding, which indexes information for each buyer and groups all their monthly invoices into one envelope — rather than sending invoices separately. We also demonstrated how the data we process is secured because we destroy all data within 24 hours of producing an invoice statement.
Once the retailer was comfortable with our process and procedure, we embarked on a proof of concept
— running jobs in tandem with the previous vendor for a trial period. The retailer sent us their data through their billing systems, we printed each piece and commingled as much mail as possible for postal discounts. We ran generic filters for bad addresses and culled out atypical pieces intended for P.O. boxes or military posts. When the envelopes were ready to mail, our
RICOH ProcessDirector print workflow software automatically generated a mail manifest and the envelopes were tagged for post office delivery. After reviewing the information produced during the proof of concept, the retailer was confident we could meet the SLA requirement of 24 hour turnarounds from data receipt to mailing and reduce costs.