The Trap of Easy Color Printing

Doc has a confession to make. I'm a serial printer, and a color one at that. I love to print things to proof them, review them, and evaluate them. I don't like working on the screen, and so my Powerpoints and Word docs end up in print many times before they are final. I know I should be saving resources but I can't help myself. It's just the way I work and my work is better for it.

I hate to be wasteful, I really do, but I've sized up the alternatives and determined that I'm well within reason to print as much as I do. First and foremost, my commitment is to my employer to do a good job, not save on printing costs.

And because part of my job is to evaluate my employer's image, I have to look at the color too – that's part of the proofing process. So black and white interim copies just won't do.

Of course, not everyone in the organization has my specific needs, so a one-size-fits-all policy clearly wouldn't work. A good MPS program has to allow for people like Doc, who measure productivity by the number of copies in my waste basket. If I'm making copies, I'm making progress.

But don't worry – eventually the habitual printers like me will retire and the new generation will be perfectly content working on the screen. For me, though, the quality of my work done in print is better than when the same work is done on the screen. So, by the end of the day, my recycle bin is usually full.

There, I've admitted it. I feel a lot better now. But I swear I take my own recycled bags to Trader Joes, so I get a few offset credits.