How to excel at printing

I've covered double-sided printing in an earlier post. Today I'm going to give you a few handy tips about printing Excel spreadsheets and what you can do to reduce paper use. I'm aware that other spreadsheet packages are available and if you use them and have any tips please leave a comment below.

So, Jeff from Sales has just emailed you an Excel document showing last weeks sales figures and every day you print it out and file it away in a cupboard somewhere. But wait - there must be a better way than this!

If you don't need it, don't print it! This sign hangs above the printer in our office, and it's a good place to start. Do you really need to print this spreadsheet? Does anyone ever look at it? Will they ever need it again? If it needs to be kept then perhaps it would be better to save a digital copy somewhere and take a backup?

OK, so you do need a printed copy of the spreadsheet - the paperless office isn't with us yet. But each week the Sales spreadsheet gets bigger (Jeff's good at his job). It extends over several pages and the totals column is always on a page of its own. And half the data is irrelevant - nobody wants to know how much Jeff is spending on champagne lunches with the customer. Don't worry - we've got it sorted...

Firstly, use the mouse to select the part of the spreadsheet you want to print. This is the bit where you can ignore Jeff's earnings forecast for next month. He gets paid too much and nobody wants to be reminded about that. From the File menu select Print Area and then Set Print Area.

Print Preview is your friend! This handly little option can also be found in the File menu and it shows you exactly how the spreadsheet will look on paper. The Setup button is where it's at and the Fit to: radio button (on the Page tab) could probably be one of the biggest paper savers in your office. If the spreadsheet is too wide, try printing it landscape. Decrease margins for a better fit. Add headers and footers to help guide your viewers around the pages of the spreadsheet.

Finally, don't forget to print double sided. The finished spreadsheet will look professional and you'll have saved paper, toner and energy. And that can only be a good thing.