Whyte & Mackay make substantial savings.
By adopting Annodata’s Managed Print and Unified Communications services.
Case study about
Founded in Glasgow in 1844, Whyte & Mackay is a producer of alcoholic beverages, currently holding around 8% of the UK whisky market. The company is owned by Emperador Inc., a subsidiary of Alliance Global Group and the third-largest alcohol provider in the global beverage market. Whyte & Mackay has over 500 employees split across eight locations in Scotland, producing whisky brands such as Jura, Dalmore and Fettercairn, as well as a range of vodkas and liqueurs.
In February 2021, the company won Distiller of the Year at the prestigious Icons of Whisky Scotland awards.
The Challenge
Whyte & Mackay relies heavily on its print estate to produce, share and manage important documents. Prior to working with Annodata, the company operated a fleet of around 60 printers and a range of photocopiers.
These devices didn’t have an effective Managed Print services solution, with no software in place to control costs, minimise document duplication or reduce excessive paper usage. Instead, printers were managed on an ad-hoc basis by teams at each of Whyte & Mackay’s sites. This meant the company often ended up sitting on expensive toner that it didn’t need, or used more paper than necessary.
Mark Hilson, Head of Business Systems at Whyte & Mackay, said: “On average, we print in excess of 600,000 pages a year. However, we needed to gain a greater degree of control of our print estate, in order to bring printing volumes down and increase visibility of which departments were printing what.
Making print more secure was also a key target, so we needed a solution that could complement our existing security policies and shore up our overall capabilities in this area.” Alongside print, Whyte & Mackay also needed to transform its telephony estate. Its previous implementation was a combination of traditional ISDN, PSTN and hosted VoIP solutions, which the company wanted to consolidate into a single platform. This would reduce telephony costs, while enabling staff across different sites and those working remotely to communicate with one another effectively.
We needed a solution that could complement our existing security policies and shore up our overall capabilities in this area.
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The solution
Following a competitive tender process and a series of discovery sessions, Whyte & Mackay selected Annodata to enhance its print estate and Unified Communications capabilities. On the print side, Annodata introduced a new fleet of 72 Kyocera multi-function printers (MFPs) and 18 thermal printers. These were integrated with Papercut Follow-Me software and Kyocera Fleet Management Software, as well as an enterprise content management (ECM) solution to aid invoice processing and workflow digitisation.
All of these services aimed to reduce unnecessary paper usage, while increasing security and giving IT teams a more holistic view of the entire print estate. For Unified Communications, Annodata installed a fully hosted Mitel UC platform across all eight sites including remote distilleries, the Glasgow head office and distribution hubs across Scotland. We utilised their implementation of Cisco Meraki routers, replacing the old ISDN arrangement. The Mitel solution supports over 300 staff with MiCollab softphones, enabling continuous end-to-end communication between all staff.
“We worked closely with IT teams at Whyte & Mackay to ensure all the bases were covered. ” Jason Wright, Senior Account Manager at Annodata, said: “Throughout the implementation process, we worked closely with IT teams at Whyte & Mackay to ensure all the bases were covered.
The collaboration worked well, with Whyte & Mackay staff taking charge of implementing Mitel desktop users and handling the intricacies of remote working using the MiCollab software. Annodata trained the core network team in making full use of their new print and UC capabilities, and the network engineers then embraced the new implementation quickly.”
The result
Thanks to the implementation, Whyte & Mackay is now experiencing significant cost savings every year across print and communications. The suite of Managed Print services has reduced print volumes and a subsequent 10-15% drop in overall print costs. The new thermal printers are another area where additional savings will be made each year.
The UC solution has also helped Whyte & Mackay to save a substantial amount per annum on calls alone. Crucially, staff were able to continue communicating with one another during national lockdowns, which minimised disruption to the business and brought versatility when needed.
Mark said: “Annodata helped us choose the right technology to suit our needs, and we collaborated closely with them throughout the whole process to ensure a successful implementation. We now have a fully integrated print estate with enhanced functionality at a lower cost than before.
“As well as improved security, we can now better monitor our staff’s printing habits and get them thinking more deeply about what they print. This means we spend less on printing while lowering our overall carbon footprint.”
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Our collaboration with Annodata has been a successful one.”
Key points
- Whyte & Mackay are now making signifi cant savings per annum across print and communications.
- The suite of Managed Print services achieved a 10% reduction in print volumes and a subsequent 10-15% drop in overall print costs.
- Communication minimised disruption to the business and brought versatility when needed during national lockdown.
