UK's top 30 print resellers defy paperless office as sales top £1bn

Print providers are posting net profits nearly two percentage points above the VAR 300 average, according to the 2019 Print Provider Report

Brushing off predictions that the rise of the paperless office would drive it to extinction, the print channel remains a growing - and profitable - corner of the channel.

That's according to the latest market report from CRN Essential, which profiles the top 30 print-specialist resellers and MSPs on our radar and examines the trends impacting their businesses.

The 30 firms featured in the 2019 Print Provider report - available here exclusively to CRN Essential subscribers - grew their collective revenues by nearly a quarter to £1.18bn in their most recent financial years, generating profits unheard of in other market niches.

With average net profit margins standing at nearly five per cent - compared with just 3.0 per cent for the wider CRN VAR 300 - ink's ‘black gold' tag appears to still be justified.

Most organisations are printing more responsibly, but the paperless office ideal has failed to fully materialise; there is even some evidence that organisations are printing more than ever.

James Kight, managing director of Printerland, ranked seventh in the report, said his firm's revenues in May are tracking eight per cent up year on year.

"Print is just very, very resilient," he said. "Will we get to a paperless world? I just don't see it. I'm very bullish about the future."

And yet the providers profiled also recognise that diversification is the key to their survival. Print is a mature market which - some argue - is now in managed decline, and end users are under more pressure than ever to print less, or at least more responsibly.

Against this subdued backdrop, print providers are building businesses helping customers digitise as well as print documents, and are expanding into adjacent markets such as unified communications and desktop-as-a-service.

Former Samsung and HP executive Mark Ash (pictured) recently joined fourth-ranked Altodigital as its chief sales and marketing officer, and said he was enlisted specifically to grow the West Midlands-based outfit beyond its traditional print and copier stomping ground.

"Print is a mature market and the volumes are declining. If you don't want your business to go backwards, it's important that you add incremental business onto the core," he said.

It is a quirk of the print industry that four of the top 30 providers are now owned by manufacturers. This includes top-ranked print VAR Apogee, which was snapped up by HP last August.

Mark Garius, managing director of 19^th-ranked outfit ASL, said the trend had turned OEMs that were previously his key suppliers into competitors as well as partners.

"ASL has excellent relationships but it doesn't mean that it takes that for granted," he said. "We are constantly monitoring our base and prospects to see if the line is being crossed."

Report highlights

• Profiles of the top 30 print-focused resellers and MSPs on CRN's radar, ranked by revenue
• Analysis of their revenues, profits, headcount and pay
• An overview of the trends impacting their business, including digitisation, growth hotspots such as print production and managed print, diversification and vendor-led consolidation
• Exclusive interviews with top print channel executives

CRN Essential subscribers can view the full report here