Till the mid of the 90s, things in the office supplies industry was moribund or stagnant. The same paper, pencils, copier-paper, fax-paper, clips and stapling pin were the staple. Or so thought the entire industry! What they had not factored for was that a new technology was right on top of them, and in no time, crush them into a pulp.
The internet. It changed everything right from the way we looked at communication and information to the way we look and took entertainment. That, was the 90s. Into the present, things have become even more different with the likes of office supplies software making an entry. What it has done to the industry is something no one could have wildly guessed in the last two decades. And all this change in no small measure is also due to the office supply dealer software!
Some of the more discernible trends in the office supplies industry which to an extent can be attributed to the office supplies software include:
1. A sea-change in consumption patterns! With online software (cloud for the public), we have stopped buying a lot of things including disk drives, CDs, DVDs, Software patches etc. Even things like virus patches etc are something not many want these days. That besides, with online storage become as big as the universe, who in their right frame of mind would still want things printed on paper and stores? So, along with the others, our goes paper, and all storage systems right from files to storage cabinets! Pins, clips and the likes don’t seem to matter anymore!
2. Renting is in & buying is going out! Office supplies software, and more so, the online ones have seen to it that every bit of software invested in would be a revenue expense instead of a capital expense! Besides the issue of maintenance, upgrading and growth, a software that is taken on rent is much less an expense than one bought outright. On top of that, there are those who give the entire suite of services for a fixed sum of money with incremental charges being taken for more than a specified number of transactions!
3. Buying trends have changed! There was a time when buying in bulk of every office supplies was considered prudent. You buy in bulk, get a discount, and be happy about it. Not today. With space being available only at a premium, buying in bulk just to get a good rate and then spending on rentals isn’t taken to be prudent at all. Plus, with competition coming from every corner, rates are not a problem at all today. Owing to these factors, and with the presence of efficient Office Supplies Software, buying for “just in time” is the trend!
4. Online presence is essential, a need! The best office supplies software which invariably is on the cloud gives one the freedom from owning or occupying physical spaces, and incurring unnecessary expenses which are just that, and which additionally do not add anything to the bottom line. Better still, use the best Office Supply Dealer Software which has every important suite including CRM to give one the clout to advertise oneself online. CRMs in the best Office Supply Dealer Software gives one the essential depth to segregate categories of clients based on varied parameters and deal with them accordingly! That, and the internet gives the office supplies industry the required wherewithal to pin-point needs and address them accordingly.
5. Competition from newer products and service channels is changing by the day! Till a while back it was website-based sales, and then e-commerce sites. Now, it’s a mix of everything that the yesteryears threw at us plus some seriously futuristic ways of selling including voice-based SEO so that even without typing a word, one can command the search-engine to pin-point the one place where you get office supplies at the lowest prices.
6. Lean buying is in! With most organizations being just names in the cyber-world, the need for office supplies too has likewise changed in most parts. With offices you need stuff. Without it, you can survive and prosper on very little. And when that happens, you go for the best and to those places only where rates are good and quality best. In this case, most organizations use office supply software to identify the best and most efficient of suppliers, chalk down their practices such as credit terms and supply schedules and then go for the kill. In all they save a lot for themselves. And also, for the environment, because one paper less consumed means so much less trees chopped down!