TCPglobal - news, views and issues on total cost of printing

Issue #0839/1 - Total Cost of Printing varies enormously from printer to printer, largely depending on the pricing strategy of the manufacturer and the type and technology of the device in question – such is the primary message of TCPglobal, together with the need for buyers to make an educated choice with TCP as a major component. In this article we show how that, in itself, is not enough for those users who are particularly price or cost-sensitive and who need to achieve maximum return from their investment, particularly in the economic climate we are in right now, showing just how much is to be gained or lost through shopping around.

Some outlets are currently charging up to 116% more for printers and 92% for their supplies than others. Or, to turn it the other way round, careful choice of outlet could save users up to 46% on their total printing costs.

To avoid attempting to pull too much confusing data into the article, we’ll focus on a couple of inkjet devices, a couple of mono laser devices and a couple of colour laser devices.

Please note that these product selections are not intended in any way to be a competitive grouping but to illustrate, with a variety of manufacturers and product types, the scale of pricing variation that can be found.

Please also note that prices can change every day and that some outlets may sell these printers at prices even higher than those shown here. Some outriders in the data have been ignored. All prices are highest or lowest street price sourced in Germany and include tax.

With the range of prices extending as far as 116% (Brother DCP-9040CN), buyers should be aware that there may be implications involved in buying from one outlet over another. For instance, a buyer simply wishing to acquire the device, with no service element because there are adequate IT skills in-house, may be happy to buy from an outlet that does nothing but deliver that device – commonly known as ‘box-shifters’. This buyer is comfortable with this approach because there is no need for any support from the reseller and would rather pay as little as possible for the hardware.

On the other hand, buyers with less experience, and a lower IT skill set in-house, will almost certainly want to choose a reseller based on relationship and the level of support that is accessible from that reseller. In these circumstances, a higher price may be payable, with considerable justification and resulting in lower overall cost in the long-term.

Buyers should, however, be careful to check the skill level of the reseller before making a purchase because higher price does not necessarily mean better skills.

In the table above (and accompanying chart below), we see that in half the instances the highest price quote is more than 75% above the lowest quote, while in only two instances is the difference less than 50% (but still over 40%).

Highest Quote vs Lowest Quote

It is Brother’s colour laser AiO that attracts the highest variance – and this is one instance where several outriders were eliminated from the data at the top end. What we should note is that there is no clear trend in terms of price variance by printer category (although a full-scale survey covering all manufacturers in all categories would be needed to prove that point conclusively). In this small sample, there is no category where price differences are consistently higher or lower than in the other categories.

One trend that was noticed while undertaking the research though, was that Xerox products tend to fall within a much tighter pricing band than products from other manufacturers. Variance is typically in the region of 10-15%. It is for this reason only that there is no Xerox product represented here.

We can observe exactly the same high price variance situation in the pricing of supplies, which, of course, rolls forwards as the major component of Total Cost of Printing.

Highest Quote vs Lowest Quote

Highest Quote vs Lowest Quote

In principle, we find that those instances where there is a high variance within hardware purchase pricing, the variance within supplies pricing tends to be fairly low – and vice versa! The one exception to this rule is the Lexmark device, where there are high pricing variances within both hardware and supplies.

Nominal CPP is the one area in this analysis where some comparison between models, manufacturers and categories is valid. This needs a mention because it should strongly be noted that the nominal CPP for mono printing on the Lexmark device is far and away the highest amongst all of the devices shown. This is not good news for Lexmark owners – a message that TCPglobal has consistently attempted to convey over the years.

While variation between lowest and highest nominal CPP for colour printing on the Lexmark device is every bit as high as for mono printing (83% against 81%), the scale of the nominal CPP is not at all as outrageous compared to the other colour devices as the nominal mono CPP. In fact, here we see some proof to refute the common misconception that colour laser is a less costly technology for businesses than colour inkjet (for expansion on this topic, please see "“People say colour laser is cheaper than colour inkjet - true or false?”").

If we move on to Total Cost of Printing over a three-year period of ownership, we find that the figures are much more closely aligned to supplies pricing and nominal CPP than to hardware purchase price.

For instance, Brother’s DCP-9040CN demonstrates a 116% variation in hardware purchase price against 46% and 54% variations in mono and colour nominal CPP but the variance in Total Cost of Printing comes in at only 57%.

Similarly, variation in Total Cost of Printing on Samsung’s CLX-2160N falls at 63%, close to the variations on nominal mono and colour CPP of 65% and 66%, while price variation for the hardware is only 48%.

Highest Quote vs Lowest Quote

More than anything though, we have to recognise that careful shopping around could enable us to align our Total Cost of Printing at the lower end of these huge differences, saving us large sums of money in the process.

For instance, this could make the difference between spending only €943 instead of €1,731 over three years on the Lexmark X4850. Getting this wrong would equate to an overspend of 84%!

At a time when pennies seem to count for more than we’ve ever known, the need to shop around to find the best deal for us as individuals also seems more vital than ever. This should not mean breaking long-standing and valued relationships with existing suppliers. The consequences of that action could easily be an increase in costs instead of a reduction if the net result were a drop in service levels. However, where no special relationship exists, and service levels are of little consequence, then this may be the time to shop around and protect our own pockets.

~End~

This entry was posted on Monday, December 8th, 2008 at 12:40 pm and is filed under Printer Market, Pricing, Comparisons, Total Cost of Printing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.