Reducing Waste in Commercial Printing: Strategies and Best Practices

In an era where ‘go paperless’ has become synonymous with corporate sustainability efforts, commercial printing can seem like an inherently wasteful enterprise. And, frankly, that may have been true in the past. But today’s modern waste reduction strategies have transformed the industry. In this blog, we’ll show how precision, efficiency, and innovation have come together to form our current best practices and make eco-conscious commercial printing good business.

Where Most Print Waste Comes From 

To address any problem, we first need to understand its cause. Historically, there have been a few major sources of waste in the print industry:

1. Over-ordering and Unused Inventory: Sometimes it’s the print shop being sloppy with its ink and paper orders. Sometimes, it’s the clients miscalculating the number of copies they’ll need. Either way, inventory mismanagement has long been one of the greatest sustainability challenges in the world of print.
2. Poor File Setup: Lack of proper proofing prior to commencing a print run leads to more than just wasted ink and paper. The printing plates themselves also need to be remade, adding metal and chemical waste into the mix.
3. Inefficient Layouts: When a print or packaging run is not optimized to fit the maximum number of copies per sheet, paper is wasted in the form of excess trimmings.

The Most Effective Ways to Reduce Waste

Addressing these major sources of waste in the print industry requires greater precision and efficiency. It also requires that we adopt an innovation mindset towards our print processes and materials. 

Ultimately, there are innumerable ways that changes can be made. But some of the most universally applicable options for all print shops include:

• Increasing short runs and introducing fast turnaround on-demand printing services, so clients are less likely to over-order ‘just in case’.
• Leveraging smart tools to assist with layout optimization and order batching, maximizing the percentage of each sheet of paper that gets used.
• Narrowing print campaigns to more targeted audiences, while using variable data printing and in-house mailing services to distribute prints more efficiently.

Why Waste Reductions Improves ROI

Above all, reducing waste in the print process means saving money. Fewer materials wasted means fewer materials that need to be ordered in the first place. And less energy expended means reduced overhead costs. Best of all, these cost savings don’t stop. They continue to add up with every print job, into perpetuity. 

At Wallace Carlson, we’ve already been delivering print excellence for more than 90 years. And we see no reason why we can’t keep going for 90 more. If you add up all the material and energy savings that waste reduction strategies will net us over those coming decades, the ultimate ROI is countless times more than any initial investment we make. And that’s why, whenever possible, we choose to improve the sustainability of our print practices.

Got a sustainable printing project in mind? Get in touch with us today to discuss what Wallace Carlson can do for you!