ImagesMagUK_Digital-Edition_Dec17

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT www.images-magazine.com 60 images DECEMBER 2017 Marshall Atkinson is the professional services director for InkSoft, and program owner for the new InkSoft Production Manager software. In his professional services capacity, Marshall provides coaching to shops on operational efficiency, continuous improvement and workflow strategy, business planning and strategy, employee motivation and management and sustainability. w marshall@inksoft.com shop has a challenge with the order, you are on the hook to make it right. Communication For large orders communication with your staff regarding the expectations and job information is the key to starting out on the right foot. There can’t be any last minute surprises, and it is imperative that all of the details are correct on the work order, art approval form or mock-up, and especially shipping dates. Don’t use a padded date as that creates confusion and distrust with your production staff. Use the real date, and as the job progresses have everyone informed as to the status. On the client side, your customer service rep should occasionally send them a note regarding progress and to let them know that the order is on track. Intangibles Huge print runs can affect the other jobs on your schedule. They will tie up a press (or presses) for days at a time, and may put a strain on other orders in the system. If you don’t have a second shift or print on weekends, you may consider working some overtime for this large order just to get it out of the way. Overtime and any other special considerations should have been thought about before accepting the job, but if you get in a situation where you need it, always opt for getting the order out. Keep the morale up amongst your press crews. Bring in pizza, doughnuts, coffee or refreshments. Say ‘thank you’ and show your appreciation when your staff starts to show strain. Get in there and help out. Finishing the job Get the order prepped for shipping by stacking the skids neatly. Skids should be organised so that they are all one shirt size as much as possible. All boxes should be clearly marked with order information on a label, with the label placed on the box in the same location on every one. Neatness counts. Don’t handwrite anything, use your system and print a label. Once all the boxes are labelled and stacked neatly on skids, wrap each skid with shrink-wrap to secure it. This is important, as the load may shift during travel and you don’t want them to fall over or become a problem. Show me the money For any order in your shop, collecting the payment is imperative to keeping your business running smoothly. When discussing gigantic orders, this can make or break a shop as a ridiculous amount of money can be on the line. Often, these large orders will have the customer purchasing the inventory, which is good for the screen printer as that doesn’t tie up a huge amount of cash. If you are ordering the blanks you absolutely need to get a very large deposit before even entering the order in your system. Don’t buy any inventory unless you have a deposit. Get money up front, have signed purchase orders or contracts, run a credit check, and be sure to have several conversations about payments. Also, it’s important that you outline your defect and misprint policy on this order. What percentage is the ratio for the order? Does it have to ship 100% complete? Are extra shirts being ordered with the initial inventory to cover any potential misprints, or is that your responsibility? Every client is different, so don’t assume your policy matches how they think this order will work. You don’t have to be scared of a monster job if you’ve never handled one before. They are just much larger cousins of the orders you handle every day. The trick for successful production is to stay organised, keep an eye out for trouble, communicate expectations with your staff and your customer, and keep track of progress as you go. You can do it! If you are ordering the blanks you absolutely need to get a very large deposit