How Persnickety Prints increased productivity by 30% for remote employees with Hubstaff

Key outcomes

• Increased productivity by ~30% for remote employees
• Saved 40–60 hours per week in payroll and oversight
• Reduced hiring costs by thousands annually through better retention
• Enhanced employee experience with flexible work supported by Hubstaff

Background

Persnickety Prints is a photo and fine art printing company helping customers preserve memories through prints, scrapbooks, and wall art. While production remains in-office, the company has expanded its marketing and support teams globally.

“We’ve gradually shifted more and more toward a remote workforce… Hubstaff made that possible.”

Today, roughly 30–40% of the workforce operates remotely, including team members across the U.S. and internationally. 

We spoke with Madison Allred, Director of Operations at Persnickety Prints, to learn how the team successfully scaled a hybrid workforce while improving productivity and maintaining operational control.

As the company adopted remote work, they needed a way to maintain accountability and visibility without adding operational overhead.

Before Hubstaff, they relied on scheduling tools and timesheets, but had no insight into productivity or how time was actually spent.

“We had no productivity measures whatsoever.”

This created challenges in managing remote performance, verifying hours worked, scaling hiring with confidence, and handling payroll manually.

Hubstaff provided a centralized system for time tracking, productivity monitoring, and payroll across a distributed team. 

Instead of juggling spreadsheets and disconnected tools, everything was managed in one place. This gave the team clear visibility into how time was spent, made it easier to support remote employees, and removed the manual work from payroll and budgeting.

Driving productivity through visibility

With Hubstaff, Persnickety Prints brought more clarity and transparency to how work is tracked and understood.

“I would say we’ve seen a productivity increase of 30% from our international employees.”

Managers use:

• Activity rates
• Screenshots
• Weekly reviews

This visibility into productivity helps ensure accountability while still allowing flexibility for different roles.

Saving time on payroll and operations

Hubstaff significantly reduced the time spent on payroll and administrative work. In total, the company estimates:

• 40–60 hours saved per week across payroll, reporting, and oversight
• Enough time savings to potentially avoid hiring additional admin staff

“We would need to add another full-time payroll operator without it.”

Retaining talent and reducing costs

Hubstaff also enabled the company to retain valuable employees who needed more flexible work arrangements.

“We’ve been able to retain key staff… saving thousands every year in hiring and onboarding costs.”

This flexibility allowed Persnickety Prints to:

• Keep experienced team members
• Hire globally
• Use fractional contractors to control costs

Final takeaway: Improving work-life balance and culture

Hubstaff also played a key role in helping Persnickety Prints preserve the flexibility and culture that matter most to their team. As a women-owned business, maintaining supportive, adaptable work environments was a priority, especially for employees balancing work and family life.

By enabling remote work without sacrificing accountability, Hubstaff allowed the company to retain experienced team members, offer more flexible roles, and create opportunities that fit real lives. This not only strengthened the team but also reinforced a culture built on trust, balance, and long-term sustainability.

Beyond operations, Hubstaff helped create clearer boundaries between work and personal time.

“It’s helped create a greater work-life balance… if you clock out, you don’t think about work.”

Employees are more focused during work hours and more present outside of them, improving both productivity and satisfaction.

Persnickety Prints is expanding into new product lines, including scrapbook kits, while continuing to grow its global team.

“Because of Hubstaff, we were able to bring on a remote designer and expand our product development.”

As the business scales, Hubstaff remains central to how they manage talent, control costs, and operate efficiently.