Standard Register reported improved earnings Friday and in April will ask shareholders to approve a plan to cut the number of the company’s outstanding shares.

The Dayton-based company reported a net loss of $209,000, or 1 cent per share, for the fourth quarter of 2012, a substantial improvement from a net loss of nearly $95.5 million, or $3.28 share, reported for the same quarter in 2011. The fourth quarter 2011 loss included a non-cash charge of $89.5 million, the company said.

For the entire year 2012, the document and brand services company reported a net loss of nearly $9.1 million or 31 cents per share, compared to a net loss in 2011 of almost $87.7 million or $3.02 per share.

Total revenue for the fourth quarter last year was put at $143.6 million, compared to $161.4 million for the final quarter of 2011. Revenue for the year 2012 was nearly $602 million, down from $648 million for 2011, the company reported.

In a conference call with industry analysts, Joseph Morgan, Standard Register president and chief executive, attributed much of that revenue loss to a “reduction in a portion of our business” by a “very large financial services customer.” He said that in 2012, $24 million of the the $46 million decline in revenue “was attributable to that one customer.”

“Our core solutions, those that will provide future growth for the company, grew in the quarter without the effect of the reduction in business from that financial services customer,” Morgan said in the call, adding that the company continues to be a customer of Standard Register.

Also, Morgan said the company filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission notification this week that it will ask shareholders at the company’s annual meeting April 25 to approve a reverse stock split.

Such an action cuts the number of a company’s outstanding shares (NYSE: SR). The company’s hope is that doing so will boost the value of the shares to meet the New York Stock Exchanges’ minimum bid price listing standard of $1 per share for 30 straight trading days.

Based in Dayton, Standard Register has 523 Dayton employees and 2,180 total employees, a company spokeswoman said.