Nick Booth (CRN)

11 Jan 2008

The Slough-based printer manufacturer teamed with two of its key resellers, the F1 Group and the Landscape Group, at last week’s British Education Training Technology (Bett) show to highlight ways in which schools and colleges can benefit from high-quality printing.

“Schools are becoming power users in terms of design and graphics and our solutions all come with a free Oki Template Manager that covers many eventualities,” said Oki communications manager, Nadia Nizar.

The key platforms Oki used to show off these capabilities at Bett were the Oki C5950, C8800 and C9650 products.

According to Ewa Johnson, marketing director at Oki, schools stand to benefit more than any other sector from efficient printing solutions. Johnson told CRN: “The ability to output high-quality colour documents on demand allows schools to save money, while engaging and inspiring pupils and helping teachers to plan class work more effectively.”

However, sources at Oki’s top reseller - Manchester-based Printerland, which has recorded a £15m turnover - believes this may not necessarily be the vendor’s top selling point.

James Kight, managing director of Printerland, said: “Schools do not have support staff, so they are desperately grateful for equipment that is reliable. I would say the reliability, service and performance are major selling points and have contributed to our success.” A good printer sits quietly in the background and does not consume the user’s time and money, keeping costs to a minimum, Kight added. The strengths of the Template Manager software should not be underplayed though, cautioned Kight. “It takes all the hassle out of printing and design and it has helped us thrive in the education sector,” he added.