Which costs more--office store copies or desk printer copies?
i use regular printing paper (not gloss) and have a solid mulit-color border two inches wide around the edge with black text in the middle.
ink for my printer is so expensive, i wonder if the office store copies are cheaper to print, especially since i can usually find a sale on color copies for 45 to 50 cents a copy.
these don't have to be "top" quality. just okay to look at.
so, any opinions out there?
Answers:
Store bought copies will be more expensive almost every time. Remember, they have to cover the cost of the ink, the building, the employees, etc.
A modern inkjet printer cartridge should last more than a year at the printing rates you describe. If you are going through them more frequently that every 12-18 months then you need to consider buying a new printer. You may also verify in the printer's settings that it is set to a medium to low dpi setting and has any added "features" turned off. Those can sometimes be huge ink hogs. Otherwise, you may also want to check into 3rd party ink.
There was a time when these cartridges were of questionable quality, but now they are virtually indistinguishable. In most cases, their cartridges are coming off the exact same production line as HP, Dell, etc.. They also usually offer a guarantee to replace your printer if something should happen to go wrong, and have a strong history of following through. Give them a shot.
No matter what you choose. There is no reason why your costs should be averaging more than .15/pg for the printing you are talking about. I have our office running at .08/pg and that is with standard stock paper and color brochures at 600dpi.
this would be much easier to answer if i knew what printer you use, but it sounds like you may indeed be better off going to a copy center.
however, if you buy paper and ink in bulk, and set your printer on a low setting (like draft), it would be possible to save over the copy center.
it really does depend on a number of things.
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