An Explosion of Color: Frisco Independent School District Reconfigures for Growth with Inkjet

Serving the diverse print needs of this expanding educator, student, staff, and family community is the Frisco ISD Print Center. A long-time Xerox shop, this in-plant print operation comprises 13 Xerox Nuvera^® 120 Presses, 2 Xerox^® Iridesse^® Production Presses, and a Xerox^® Versant^® 3100 Press in a tight footprint that—as recently as late 2020—pushed out more than 2,500 jobs a day, 10 million impressions each month.

With continual district expansion, however, the Print Center was getting concerned about their ability to take on any additional volume. There was no available physical space to squeeze more production equipment into their shop. They were “landlocked”—which was a big problem.

Suddenly, color was everywhere. “There was a desire to improve the student experience—increase retention and raise test scores,” Broderick said. “Color was exploding.”

Research has long shown that the use of color in educational materials can improve attention span and recall—so naturally teachers and administrators wanted to use color as much as possible to boost engagement. But the same Xerox^® Iridesse^® and Versant^® Presses that allowed the Frisco ISD Print Center to produce stunning, premium-color marketing materials, graduation programs, and other high-end applications, were cost-prohibitive for producing everyday color for curricula-related output. They needed a more cost-effective option.

From Headwinds to Opportunity

Early in 2020, everything changed. With pandemic restrictions keeping students at home, monthly print volume declined drastically. Coupled with looming equipment lease renewals, there was a clear opportunity to re-evaluate equipment mix, footprint, and operational efficiency.

Challenge

Affordable Color with Room to Grow

“We had to look at something that was going to give us a higher speed, and capability to do the volume that was going to come into play five years from now,” Broderick said, without growing headcount—that meant more automation for fewer touches. Also topping their list of priorities was finding a way to offer lower-cost standard color to educators and freeing up space in their packed production floor for better access and more finishing devices.

The Frisco ISD team identified their must-have objectives, which included reducing the cost of standard color output, ability to handle projected post-pandemic work volumes, and getting work in and out of the shop faster and more efficiently.

Solution

A Better Together Approach

Frisco ISD engaged their trusted Xerox team for assistance—including extensive cost/savings analysis around making the jump to inkjet, as well as discussions around reliability, automation, and increased productivity.

The resulting plan embraced their current needs—and relevant existing equipment—while providing the flexibility to scale up in the future as needs change and the district continues to grow.

By adding two Xerox^® Baltoro^® Presses, Frisco ISD was able to reduce the cost of providing high-quality, standard color curricula to their student body. And with an attractive per-page price for monochrome, the new Baltoro^® Presses could also reliably support ongoing requests for mono/black and white jobs.

Xerox^® Baltoro^® HF Inkjet Press

They also were able to:

• Right-size their production footprint for capacity and redundancy, eliminating 10 of their 13 Xerox Nuvera^® Presses and upgrading the remaining three.

• Add new inline finishing devices to speed job completion and reduce the need for hand finishing.

• Free up their Iridesse^® Press for higher-value color jobs—keeping more work in house and adding growth opportunity.

And by using Xerox^® FreeFlow^® Core workflow automation software to add vital information to job tickets, preflight and route jobs to the appropriate queue for finishing, they have added greater efficiencies and speed to their entire print operation while freeing up staff for other tasks.

Results

Flexible. Affordable. Future-Proof.

The successful transformation was achieved in a matter of months, thanks to careful planning and commitment on both the Frisco ISD and Xerox teams.

“It was really a whirlwind install,” Broderick said. “But Xerox brought its A-team, so everything went smoothly.”

Along with faster turnaround and more affordable color and mono output, Frisco ISD has set a goal of keeping more jobs in house by utilizing their Iridesse^® and Versant^® Presses to their fullest potential. “There’s a lot of potential there,” Broderick said. “People are on Zazzle.com or Pinterest, and they see things,” she said. They call and ask, “How can I get that?” She is pleased to let them know their team can help. “We now have the flexibility to give them some really diverse options.”

The increases in speed and volume—although projected and expected—surprised and delighted print shop workers—who initially were unable to keep up with sorting and bundling the faster output. “There was a lot of excitement,” Broderick said, around getting to know the new equipment and capabilities of the Baltoro^® Press. “That was huge.”

Xerox^® iGen^® 5 Press

Be ingenious.

Xerox^® FreeFlow^® Core

Automation and integration for your entire print workflow.