If you have travelled anywhere in Australia by plane since 2010 you probably have visited a WHSmith store. Their first store opened in 2010 in Melbourne Airport and within a short period of time they have grown to over 50 stores operating in Australia and over 500 employees.

WH Smith is a leading global retailer with a presence in over 25 countries, serving its customers from over 1,300 stores across the globe. With such an extensive presence worldwide, WHSmith was proud to open their first store in Australia back in 2010. Their first store opened its doors in Melbourne Airport and within a short period of time, the business has grown substantially – and it continues to grow – with stores now open in Sydney, Adelaide and Perth.

Their goal is to be the leading retailer in convenience, books and news for the world’s travelling customer. They understand our customers and know that in the locations in which they operate people have less time to browse and their focus on instore design and excellent customer service reflects this. Early in 2012 the business acquired the brand Fresh+ – a hospital café business, serving fresh food and refreshments to visitors and patients.

As they have continued to grow the business, innovation has been at the heart of everything they do. Their aim is to move at the same pace as their customers, always ensuring they are at the forefront of everything they do

The Challenge

Challenge WH Smith had two major challenges when it came to their printing requirements – their multiple locations and where they were placed, along with a busy customer-facing environment where uptime was of prime importance. The challenge for every WHSmith was that the device was either in a regional, or difficult-to-get-to, location (such as a hospital or Airport).Epson’s Heat-Free print technology means less moving parts so more reliable printing and increased up time. The high-yield inks (up to 8 times longer than comparative lasers) gave staff less disruptions and more time to attend to their customers needs..

The Solution, The Benefits

With minimal interventions – both service and consumables replacement – as one of their buying criteria, along with price-performance, WH Smith was keen to understand the benefits Epson could bring to the table.

Epson excelled on both counts, the reliability of their Heat-Free technology not only improved staff morale but also customer service capability. The Epson high-yield ink consumables for both the A4 (up to 50,000 pages) and A3 (up to 100,000 pages) models not only provided WHSmith with the minimal disruptions they were looking for, it also enabled them to dramatically reduce their overall running costs.
In fact Orion Print Management, Epson’s Premier Partner, quantified the total cost savings over the contract period to be just over 80% in power and running cost.

The Return-on-Investment

As much as WHSmith appreciated the cost savings of the Epson devices, the real return-on-investment here was the extra time staff could spend with their customers. And with Orion Print Management proactively and professionally managing their fleet, the WHSmith IT Management team could now focus their time on key IT projects.

Orion is Epson Australia’s Premier Partners. We improve organisational effectiveness by providing comprehensive content management, accelerating shared business processes by facilitating information-sharing across boundaries for better business insight. The measure of
their company is reflected in the testimony of their customers, and WHSmith is an excellent example of what positive impact they can bring to your business.