PRESS OFFICE: Nashua

Contract caterer Feedem Pitseng replaced its existing printers at customer sites with fast, reliable HP Pro X 476 machines. Remote monitoring software enables Nashua to manage consumables and replace them when needed, removing a time-consuming job previously handled by Feedem Pitseng’s head office.

The challenges

As the largest independent contract catering company in South Africa, Feedem Pitseng cooks and serves meals at locations across the country, including schools, hospitals and businesses.

At each site, the company has a small office, which needs to be able to print menus and other items such as stock sheets and quotes. In the Western Cape region, Feedem Pitseng had an existing fleet of 96 printers and multi-function printers (MFPs) for this task. Almost all locations have one machine, while a few have two.

Managing these devices was time-consuming for the company’s administrative staff at its Cape Town office. Tertia Swart, operations manager for support services at Feedem Pitseng, comments, “Every month there was an order to replace cartridges for each device, and we had to make sure everything was stocked.

“It was a hassle, and we had multiple different models of printers to manage,” continues Swart. “We wanted to simplify things, and to also save money.”

The solution

To replace Feedem Pitseng’s existing fleet, Nashua recommended the HP Pro X 476 MFP, which is up to twice the speed and half the running cost of colour laser printers. The HP Pro X 476 is based on HP PageWide technology, ensuring high reliability and low expenditure on consumables. At several sites where space is at a premium, the company chose the smaller HP Pro X 476.

“We’d worked with Nashua for a long time before this project, providing copiers in our central offices, and everything had gone well,” says Swart.

Initially, Feedem Pitseng replaced its existing devices with 96 new printers. Since then, it has added around another 30 machines, and purchased another HP Pro X 476 for each new site when it wins a new contract.

By completing replacing its printers, Feedem Pitseng now benefits from the latest technology, with the new machines achieving up to 70 pages per minute – the fastest desktop printer in the world. It prints around 35,000 pages per month; 80% is in black and white, and 20% in colour.

Long relationship

“Nashua keeps a check on the printers remotely using monitoring software, which means that it is aware as soon as ink levels are low, and can order another cartridge to be delivered directly to the site. The software also alerts Nashua if there is any problem with one of the printers.

“It’s saved us the time-consuming task of keeping stock of different types of cartridge in the Cape Town office, and making sure they’re all here,” says Swart.

The software provides reports to Feedem Pitseng on print volumes, showing exactly what has been printed and how Nashua has charged for it. The company can also use these reports to look into any unusual activity, for example if an unexpectedly high number of pages has been printed at one location.

Cost savings and new features

The new solution saves Feedem Pitseng around 20-30% per month. Swart comments, “It’s not a large difference, but as a catering company we are extremely cost-driven, so all savings are good savings – and they quickly mount up.”

“The best new feature of the printers is that they can scan and fax as well as printing – that’s a big plus point,” says Swart. “Before, we had to ask our client to use their fax machine if we needed to send a document, but now it’s much easier to fax and to scan to our computers.”

Reliable operation

Under the terms of the contract, Nashua also provides onsite maintenance. Nashua has offices throughout South Africa, enabling it to provide local support to Feedem Pitseng’s printers at all locations. Swart comments, “Nashua’s service and support has been very good – if there is any problem, we phone them and they sort it immediately.”

“We’ve had good comments from our staff about the new printers, and the machines have been really reliable,” says Swart. “It’s important for our company’s image to have colour menus printed and on show, so a printer failure is not an option for us.

“I would definitely recommend Nashua, we’ve completely removed the hassle of managing and ordering cartridges, and this solution would work well for anyone who has a high number of printers,” concludes Swart.

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For further information on any aspect of becoming a customer reference for Nashua , please contact Nashua’s communications manager, Jessica Midlane – [email protected].

For more information please visit www.nashua.co.za, or follow them on Twitter and Facebook