Mike McGuirk Brings the Best and Worst to ProCopy

Mike McGuirk Persident of ProCopy Office Solutions, Tempe, AZ

Mike McGuirk
Persident of ProCopy Office Solutions, Tempe, AZ

Once a dealer, always a dealer. That pretty much sums up the career of Mike McGuirk, president of ProCopy Office Solutions in Tempe, AZ. After a long and successful career in the business, including a senior management position at a local UniCopy and Danka for almost 20 years, he was hired in 2002 as president of the Arizona Global Imaging Company, a Ricoh and Canon dealership. Under his leadership, the company grew from $9 million to over $50 million in 6 years.

When Global sold to Xerox in 2007, it seemed like a good move at the time, but time was not on McGuirk’s side because shortly after the sale, the dynamics of the dealership changed. Within 2 years he found himself on the outside of the industry looking in for the first time since 1983.

“The Xerox announcement hit us hard because we were Ricoh and Canon and both of those companies dropped us within 30 days,” recalls McGuirk. “We were the only core company of the 20 that didn’t carry Konica. And Konica continued with Global for almost three years, as did Sharp and Toshiba.”

McGuirk isn’t shy about sharing his opinions about the industry and feels that selling Xerox instead of  Canon and Ricoh was a downgrade. “When we first saw a Xerox black & white, we said this is the Canon product from 1998,” recalls McGuirk. “It was four generations behind. Their color product was pretty good, but in 2008 the black & white was clearly inferior.”

Around the time of the Xerox acquisition, the downturn in the economy hit Arizona hard. That old saw, “Knowledge is Power,” didn’t mean much to the powers that be at Xerox who let McGuirk and his years of experience walk away. Stuck with a 1 year non-compete, McGuirk took a deep breath, bided his time, learned to play golf, and at the end of the year was more than ready to get back in the business.

He fielded a few offers, but it wasn’t until he received an offer from Tim Stevenson, founder and CEO of ProCopy Solutions, who worked with McGuirk at a Canon dealership in 1985 that got his attention. It was an offer McGuirk couldn’t refuse. Suddenly, he was back again, helping build ProCopy’s copier and printer business.

The offers he did refuse came from manufacturers who were offering positions that seemed too cookie cutter. “My success has been from creative thinking where if you can’t get in through the door, go through the window,” notes McGuirk.

When Stevenson founded ProCopy in 2000 the company’s focus was copier service. It didn’t have a line until Stevenson purchased a Canon C-Line dealer and became an authorized Canon dealer in 2008. At that point he didn’t have a sales and marketing team. That’s where McGuirk fit in.

McGuirk came onboard as an equity partner and spent the first year or so logging sweat equity and figuring out the niche that ProCopy would fit. As ProCopy’s copier sales grew, McGuirk started hiring some of the same people who worked for him in the past. “We hired four sales guys, one of the top technicians, an IT guy, and a VP of sales–we even hired the driver.”

One of the benefits of working for ProCopy if you’re a service tech is its generous reimbursement policy. “We reimburse at the government rate,” explains McGuirk. “When we’re shopping for techs and it comes down to us and another company, they like that a lot. We know we overpay a little, but it’s great for recruitment and one of the advantages of having a partner that came from the service side of the business.”

ProCopy is still a small dealership with only 35 employees, but average yearly revenues today hover around $12 million. Management has its sights set on raising that figure to $15 million. Considering that ProCopy revenues were just $3.2 million in 2008, the increase to $12 million is impressive. Much of that is the result of copier placements, which are up 600 percent since 2008. At the same time, printers under service contract are up 450 percent.  This growth allowed ProCopy to be named to this year’s INC 5000 list of fastest growing companies.

There’s something about working in an independent dealership that agrees with McGuirk. “It’s a great time to be independent if you have something new to say,” he maintains. “What we have to say is we’re going to take care of you better than anybody else. I know everybody says that but we put some real teeth to that and we have a 2½ hour guaranteed response time.”

If a ProCopy service tech doesn’t arrive at the customer location within that time frame, ProCopy starts taking 1 percent off of what it bills the customer for every 10 minutes it’s late.

“We’ve had that guarantee for three years and only paid on it three times,” reports McGuirk. “There are times we might be more than 2 ½ hours, but we do such a good job for our customers, they say, ‘You know what, we’re not going to hold you to the fire if you’re 20 or 30 minutes late.’”

The Arizona market is a competitive one and ProCopy’s primary competition is a big independent dealer along with all the manufacturer’s direct branches, particularly Ricoh. “They’re the 500 lb gorilla,” acknowledges McGuirk about the independent dealer. “They’re hard working guys and I respect what they do and they’ve done a great job. But they move fast and try to get a contract in front of the customer in the first meeting.”

How does ProCopy compete with a competitor whose reps whip out a contract on the first meeting?

“We came up with the strategy of slowing deals down so people get to see more than the price on the proposal,” responds McGuirk. “I always tell our guys if price was the only issue wouldn’t everybody be driving Kia’s?”

What has also helped ProCopy grow its copier business are the direct branches. Not only are they some of ProCopy’s biggest competitors, they’re also great at unintentionally driving business their way. That’s because they do a mediocre job of taking care of their customers.

“We just got a large one yesterday for that exact reason,” notes McGuirk. “It’s not that they do a bad job, the customer just can’t get a hold of anybody. And they’ve gone through three local [managers]. That plays right up our alley.”

ProCopy has another distinction that has helped it stand out in the market above and beyond being the guys who say they provide some of the best service in the market. They’re also the copier dealer that drops copiers from cranes.  McGuirk borrowed the idea from a Michigan company that used to drop a copier off a building. He’s taken it a step further by turning it into a contest with companies throughout the region vying for the celebrated title of ‘The Worst Copier in Arizona.’

Some of the responses ProCopy has received from companies looking to claim that title have been wild. “We had one company tell us they call their copier The Bob Marley because ‘It be jamming,’” laughs McGuirk. “We’ve had some really funny responses and feedback and always do a fundraiser around it. They can bring something and we’ll drop it from a crane for a donation to charity.”

This is their third sweepstakes since McGuirk joined ProCopy in 2010 and the event has been combined with a tailgate party for Arizona State University Athletics. Its popularity has exceeded McGuirk’s wildest expectations and generated media frenzy.

“What I didn’t expect was the press coverage; every year it’s covered by TV stations,” states McGuirk.  “We’ve become known as the company that drops the copier off a crane.”

Mike with the Winner of The Worst Copier in AZ Contest

Mike with the Winner of
The Worst Copier in AZ Contest

When it’s not dropping copiers off cranes, ProCopy is making a move into Managed Network Services. It recently partnered with an IT Services company to offer those services to its customers.  The goal, however, is for ProCopy to eventually offer this service on its own.

“We’ve been honest with them,” states McGuirk. “We eventually want those customers to be our customers when there’s an economy of scale to do that. Right now it’s not the best for profits because somebody else has to make money, but it’s the best way for a company of our size to get into Managed Network Services without taking too much risk. I believe in taking risks, but calculated risks. We’ve been telling customers it’s a one- or two-year relationship and eventually we want to do it ourselves. Our goal is to create such a great partnership that you don’t want to leave us.”

Speaking of great partnerships, McGuirk couldn’t be happier about being back in the industry and helping ProCopy grow its business, even if it means a yearly quest to find the worst copier in Arizona.

 

Scott Cullen
About the Author
Scott Cullen has been writing about the office technology industry since 1986. He can be reached at scott_cullen@verizon.net.