Business Forms & Checks: “The Rumors of My Death Are Greatly Exaggerated”

For many distributors, their business was built on traditional products like business forms and checks. But in today’s digital world, is there a place for those products anymore? For the answer, we can turn to the famous quote (often attributed to Mark Twain): “The rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated.” Just because paper forms and checks are declining doesn’t mean they are disappearing altogether. There are still highly profitable pockets of business if you know where to look for them—and you don’t want those profits getting snapped up by someone else.

Profitable Niches in a Declining Market

Let’s start with paper forms. Sure, huge volumes of paper forms have gone digital. Yet paper forms haven’t gone away entirely. For many businesses, especially smaller ones, paper isn’t easily replaced. Why?

• Many companies run legacy systems and don’t have the ability to support a full transition to digital forms, especially if they need cross-platform support for online, offline, and mobile.
• They may have multiple locations or high numbers of mobile users for whom a full transition to digital forms would be too costly (for example, having to supply an iPad to every mobile user).
• They may have older workforces for whom paper forms are comfortable and familiar. These users may also need to provide on-site receipts immediately, and paper-based forms do the trick nicely.

There are also many vertical markets, such as heating and cooling, hospitals and medical offices, and mechanics shops, that are still committed to paper forms.¹ Whether it’s a hospital needing to accommodate elderly patients uncomfortable with filling out intake paperwork electronically, or an old-school mechanic needing to provide receipt or write out estimates, sometimes paper remains the best fit.

We see something similar when it comes to business and personal checks. While the market is shrinking, there are pockets in which paper checks remain an important part of the mix. PYMNTS, for example, has found that 81% of businesses still pay other firms via paper checks, making this the most common B2B payment method. On the consumer side, checks still account for 8.3% of all payments. Nearly two-thirds (61%) of consumers reported using a paper check at least once in the past year.

The continued use of paper checks may seem counterintuitive, but the reasons are similar to those for paper forms. Paper checks are familiar, they are trusted, and they are well-established in businesses’ accounts receivable and accounts payable processes. On the consumer side, many Americans still trust paper checks for certain applications, especially for paying bills. For others, it is the only way to make certain payments.

Why You Should Still Sell Business Forms

Here are three other reasons to consider renewing your efforts in paper forms and checks.

1 . High-margin distributors rely on them.

While order volumes of traditional products are decreasing, profitability isn’t. One PSDA Benchmark Study found that, among high-profit distributors (defined as those having higher before-tax profits than distributors overall), sales of forms, documents, and other traditional products accounted for 40% of net revenue — 10% higher than the industry average.² Traditional business forms and checks are profitable, and the bottom lines of high-margin distributors show it.

Traditional business forms and checks are profitable, and the bottom lines of high-margin distributors show it.

2. High repeatability = high profits.

The reason high-profit distributors sell more business forms is that those products are inherently more profitable than many others. Project management is the most time-consuming part of any print order. Each custom order must be sold, the order placed, and the project managed. In contrast, repeat orders like forms and checks essentially run on autopilot. Not only do they have a tremendous profit margin built in, but once you win the job, the orders come in multiple times per year with minimal time managing the account. The repeat order is the single most profitable element in the print service industry.

Repeat orders essentially run on autopilot. Distributors can fulfill these orders with less cost, and each one has a tremendous profit margin built in.

3. They leverage your time.

Another reason paper forms and checks can deliver so much profit is that they offer leverage. Repeat orders are simple and easy to fulfill. This frees up your time to devote to other areas, including pursuing new sales opportunities.

Getting Started in This Profitable Market

How do you sell into this market and reap these kinds of high-profit jobs? We’ve put together a white paper, “Business Forms & Checks: Underestimated Value, Huge Opportunities,” detailing what types of businesses to approach and who within those businesses will be your best prospects.

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Want to learn more? Download our whitepaper “Business Forms & Checks: Underestimated Value, Huge Opportunities”

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