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Solutions December 2005
case
study
A-Grade
Solution For Schools
Come
report card time, there could
be some unhappy students at a
new charter school in Dayton,
Ohio. And they have Paul Schreiber,
regional sales manager of Cincinnati-based
distributorship PJS and Associates,
and pressure seal technology,
to blame.
Summer
is busy for Schreiber. More than
60 percent of his clients are
schools. In Ohio, a school’s
fiscal year begins July 1. That
means in June, schools begin determining
how best to spend money during
their new budget year. If Schreiber’s
going to tout a new system to
a school—and garner a sale—summer
is the time to do it. This year,
he had overwhelming success selling
equipment and paper stock for
pressure seal forms and mailers
to numerous Dayton-area schools.
Pressure
seal forms and mailers, commonly
called “PS mailers,”
are laser-printable forms with
pre-applied cohesive glue lining
the form’s edges. Once the
form is folded, the glue lines
match up and pressure seals the
form. This folded form, sealed
on all four sides, is then ready
to mail without an envelope. Common
applications include payroll and
accounts payable forms, statements,
invoices, library overdue notices,
jury summons, fund-raising letters,
bus passes, class schedules and
report cards. An efficient alternative
to folding and inserting, pressure
seal technology saves time and
money. Inherently secure, end
users no longer have to worry
about putting one employee’s
check in another employee’s
envelope. And because the mailers
are sealed on all four sides,
tampering is immediately evident.
In
August, Schreiber approached employees
at a Dayton, Ohio, charter school
based on a referral. At the time,
the school was printing multipart
continuous forms for their accounts
payable, payroll and direct deposit
forms. Once the forms were printed,
they needed to be torn apart,
folded, stuffed into an envelope
and sealed. This process required
numerous materials and lots of
time. The school already had purchased
a MICR printer, which prints variable
information (including account
numbers) on checks. But the school
wasn’t certain how to best
utilize the equipment. Pressure
seal technology seemed like a
perfect alternative, and thanks
to one additional piece of low-cost
equipment, it was an alternative
the school could afford.
Schreiber
and a sales representative from
Dayton, Ohio-based manufacturer
Wilmer demonstrated pressure seal
technology by using a low-end
ISM machine that’s able
to produce 81Ú2 x 14-inch Z-folds
or 81Ú2 x 11-inch Z-folds simply
by turning two screws and sliding
a bar back and forth. Schreiber
says on-site demonstrations are
key to selling pressure seal technology.
Many school treasurers have been
employed for years, he says, and
they’re comfortable with
doing things a certain way. New
technology can be intimidating.
On-site demonstrations allow prospective
clients to see how simple it is
to use pressure seal equipment.
Schreiber also tackles this sales
challenge by using testimonials
from satisfied clients. Most of
his clients say pressure seal
technology has cut payroll preparation
time by 40 percent. It’s
difficult for a prospective client
to ignore such a figure, no matter
how comfortable they are with
old methods.
The
charter school was impressed,
and Schreiber won the deal. Schreiber
sold them an ISM machine and blank
81Ú2 x 11-inch stock, which he
purchased from Wilmer. Now the
school simply prints the checks
using their MICR printer and puts
them through their ISM machine.
The school then can opt to mail
checks or hand them to employees.
Schreiber
says the school runs between 400
and 500 checks per pay period.
The adhesive on pressure seal
mailers does have a shelf life—one
downfall to the system. Therefore
Schreiber only sells 6-month supplies
of the forms at a time. Pressure
seal forms should be stored in
a cool, dry location, and Schreiber
says Wilmer does a good job packaging
the forms: Quantities of 500 are
shrink-wrapped with cellophane,
which prolongs shelf life.
But
the story doesn’t end here.
Because the charter school is
new, it’s anticipating growth,
says Joel Wynne, Wilmer’s
lead marketing manager. While
pressure seal technology will
help save time as the number of
checks required increases, the
technology will help in other
areas, too. Report cards are one
such example. To reduce costs,
many schools hand report cards
to students, expecting the students
to deliver them to parents. But
Wynne says approximately 30 percent
of the cards never make it home.
This leads to angry parents calling
or stopping by the school. Because
pressure seal mailers are cost-effective,
schools can print and mail secure
pressure seal report cards directly
to students’ parents. Schreiber
says he hopes the charter school
will be onboard for pressure seal
report cards by the next grading
period.
—Kara
Gebhart Uhl
1. Joel
Wynne, lead marketing manager
at Dayton, Ohio-based manufacturer
Wilmer, says it’s important
to familiarize yourself with
pressure seal equipment. The
last thing you want to do is
approach an end user blind,
so partner with a manufacturer
that can provide technical support.
Wilmer offers marketing materials
that don’t include the
company’s name. Wilmer
also provides distributors with
videos and an informative web
site, www.psmailers.com,
which features a list of pressure
seal equipment and their features,
online videos, and cost-justification
tools.
2. Focus
on more than one application.
Payroll and accounts payable
are obvious applications, but
distributors can look beyond
them. For example, when working
with a school, report cards,
bus passes, class schedules,
tuition invoices, overdue library
book notices and fund-raising
letters all can be prepared
with pressure seal technology.
3.
Even when dealing with low-end
equipment, Wynne says, many end
users are scared by the price
of pressure seal equipment. The
best way to overcome this is to
convince end users to look at
the bigger picture. Help them
focus on time savings and how
they won’t need to buy and
store envelopes.
