Summer is busy for Schreiber. More than 60 percent of his clients are schools. In Ohio, a school's fiscal year begins July 1. That means in June, schools begin determining how best to spend money during their new budget year. If Schreiber's going to tout a new system to a school—and garner a sale—summer is the time to do it. This year, he had overwhelming success selling equipment and paper stock for pressure seal forms and mailers to numerous Dayton-area schools.

Pressure seal forms and mailers are laser-printable forms with pre-applied cohesive glue lining the form's edges. Once the form is folded, the glue lines match up and pressure seals the form. This folded form, sealed on all four sides, is then ready to mail without an envelope. Common applications include payroll and accounts payable forms, statements, invoices, library overdue notices, jury summons, fund-raising letters, bus passes, class schedules and report cards. An efficient alternative to folding and inserting, pressure seal technology saves time and money. Inherently secure, end users no longer have to worry about putting one employee's check in another employee's envelope. And because the mailers are sealed on all four sides, tampering is immediately evident.

In August, Schreiber approached employees at a Dayton, Ohio, charter school based on a referral. At the time, the school was printing multipart continuous forms for their accounts payable, payroll and direct deposit forms. Once the forms were printed, they needed to be torn apart, folded, stuffed into an envelope and sealed. This process required numerous materials and lots of time. The school already had purchased a MICR printer, which prints variable information (including account numbers) on checks. But the school wasn't certain how to best utilize the equipment. Pressure seal technology seemed like a perfect alternative, and thanks to one additional piece of low-cost equipment, it was an alternative the school could afford.

Schreiber and a sales representative from Dayton, Ohio-based manufacturer Wilmer demonstrated pressure seal technology by using a low-end ISM machine that's able to produce 8-1/2 x 14-inch Z-folds or 8-1/2 x 11-inch Z-folds simply by turning two screws and sliding a bar back and forth. Schreiber says on-site demonstrations are key to selling pressure seal technology. Many school treasurers have been employed for years, he says, and they're comfortable with doing things a certain way. New technology can be intimidating. On-site demonstrations allow prospects to see how simple it is to use pressure seal equipment. Schreiber also tackles this sales challenge by using testimonials. Most of his clients say pressure seal technology has cut payroll preparation time by 40 percent. It's difficult for a prospect to ignore such a figure, no matter how comfortable they are with old methods.

The charter school was impressed, and Schreiber won the order. Schreiber sold them an ISM machine and blank 8 1/2 x 11-inch stock, which he purchased from Wilmer. Now the school simply prints the checks using their MICR printer and puts them through their ISM machine. The school then can opt to mail checks or hand them to employees.

Schreiber says the school runs between 400 and 500 checks per pay period. The adhesive on pressure seal mailers does have a shelf life—one downfall to the system. Therefore Schreiber sells only 6-month supplies of the forms at a time. Pressure seal forms should be stored in a cool, dry location, and Schreiber says Wilmer does a good job packaging the forms: Quantities of 500 are shrink-wrapped with cellophane, prolonging shelf life.

But the story doesn't end here. Because the charter school is new, it's anticipating growth, says Joel Wynne, Wilmer's lead marketing manager. While pressure seal technology will help save time as the number of checks required increases, the technology will help in other areas, too. Report cards are one such example. To reduce costs, many schools hand report cards to students, expecting the students to deliver them to parents. But Wynne says approximately 30 percent of the cards never make it home. This leads to angry parents calling or stopping by the school. Because pressure seal mailers are cost-effective, schools can print and mail secure pressure seal report cards directly to students’ parents. Schreiber says he hopes the charter school will be onboard for pressure seal report cards by the next grading period.

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