Odoo for Printing
Odoo rollouts for commercial printers
Litho, digital and mixed shops. Estimating, job tickets, spoilage and the estimated against actual number, sequenced so the pressroom is never left waiting.
Print is make to order with a different specification every time, so the estimate is the product. A printer who cannot set what a job was quoted at against what it cost is running on the estimator's instinct and the bank balance. An Odoo rollout in print starts at the estimate, because the ticket, the purchase, the spoilage and the invoice all inherit its structure.
Where it hurts today
The estimate lives on one person's machine
A spreadsheet per estimator, each with its own rates and waste assumptions. When they are on leave the shop cannot quote properly, and when they leave the pricing logic leaves with them.
Nobody knows what a job actually cost
Paper, plates, press hours and bought-in finishing land in the ledger by month and never against the job. Estimated against actual is not a report anyone can run, so quoting never improves.
Spoilage is under-reported on purpose
Waste gets booked as paper, when it gets booked at all. The ink and the press time that produced those sheets stay invisible, which is exactly why a bad make-ready looks cheap.
Proof approval is an email somebody remembers
No version, no timestamp, no named approver. Six weeks later a misprint argument is settled by whoever sounds more certain, and the reprint comes out of the printer's margin.
The delivery date is set by the salesman
Press loading and trade finisher lead times are not visible at the moment the promise is made. A finisher's queue quietly becomes a late delivery that the customer hears about last.
The modules that carry the load
Each one is here for a reason specific to commercial print, not because it appears on a standard module list.
- ๐ฏ Odoo CRM
Enquiry to estimate to won or lost with a reason, so the shop learns which work it prices wrong instead of only learning that it lost it.
- ๐ Odoo Sales
The quotation the customer signs, carrying the specification and the quantity tolerance that despatch is later measured against.
- ๐ญ Odoo Manufacturing (MRP)
Presses and finishing lines as work centres with real running speeds and hour rates, so a job is loaded against capacity rather than optimism.
- ๐ฆ Odoo Inventory
Paper by size, grain and weight, reserved to the job when the estimate is won, which is what stops two jobs claiming the same pallet.
- ๐ Odoo Purchase
Paper, plates, ink and trade finishing bought against the job, with the outworker lead time visible before a date is promised.
- โฑ๏ธ Odoo Timesheets
Make-ready and run time booked to the job by the operator, which is the half of the actual cost most shops never collect.
- ๐ผ Odoo Accounting
Job level cost and margin through to the ledger, so estimated against actual is a screen rather than a fortnight of analysis.
How the rollout runs
- 1 Rates and materials first
Press hour rates, running speeds, make-ready allowances, waste percentages, paper prices in the unit you actually buy in, and finishing setup and run rates. Nothing downstream can be trusted until these are the shop's current numbers rather than the ones written for last year's tender.
- 2 Estimating
Rebuild a set of jobs already quoted this year and compare the result against what was charged and what it cost. Every difference gets explained here, on work whose outcome is already known, instead of on live quotes.
- 3 Job tickets on the floor
Won estimates release as tickets through prepress, proofing, printing, finishing and despatch. Time and spoilage are booked at the press, and proof approval carries a version, a name and a timestamp. Run alongside the existing docket for a few weeks.
- 4 Costing and reporting
Purchases against the job, invoicing on delivered quantity inside the agreed tolerance, then estimated against actual, press utilisation, and spoilage by reason and by stage.
What to have ready before kickoff
Projects that slip usually slip here, not in the build. Bring these to the first workshop.
- โ A press list with speeds, units, maximum and minimum sheet size, and whether each one perfects.
- โ A costed hour rate per press and per finishing line that finance is willing to stand behind.
- โ The paper stock list with size, grain direction, weight and the unit the shop buys in.
- โ Make-ready allowances and running spoilage percentages the pressroom actually experiences, not the ones on the supplier sheet.
- โ Trade finishers with their lead times and price basis, because they set delivery dates you do not control.
- โ Spoilage reason codes written the way the pressroom would name them, agreed before anyone is asked to use them.
Where it connects
Systems we most often connect on commercial print projects. The full list is on the integrations page.
Printing Press
For the feature view of imposition, estimating and job tickets, read the solution page.
Open the Printing Press solutionQuestions we get asked
Can it estimate litho and digital in the same place? +
Yes, and it should, because the same enquiry often needs both quoted before it can be answered honestly. The estimate changes what it costs by press: plates and make-ready on litho, a click charge per printed side on toner, and the sheet arithmetic underneath is identical.
Will our estimator lose the ability to price on judgement? +
No. The calculation gives a cost and a target price. Typing over that price is expected, and the record then shows the margin actually taken. What changes is that the override is visible afterwards instead of invisible forever.
Do press operators have to work on a computer? +
They work off a printed ticket with a barcode and book time and spoilage by scanning at a shared screen or tablet at the press. Asking a minder to log into a desktop mid run is how shop floor data collection dies in the first month.
Can we keep our existing prepress and RIP workflow? +
Yes. Odoo does not replace prepress. It holds the job, the specification, the proof record and the cost, while artwork keeps flowing through the tools your studio already uses. Where the prepress system exposes a job number we link the two so files and tickets match.
How long does a print rollout take? +
Typical shops land in the 8 to 12 week band for estimating, tickets and job costing. The long pole is almost never the software. It is agreeing hour rates and waste percentages, which is a management decision the project cannot make for you.