New Battle In The War Over Ink Costs: Page Yield Versus Ink Quantity
January 17, 2010 - The subject of consumables' pricing for digital-imaging systems has always been a touchy one, and not just for ink-jet printers and All-in-Ones. At the high end, many vendors are reluctan
t to disclose consumables' pricing, fearing to incur the wrath of dealers who would like to keep such information under wraps. In the color ink-jet printer and All-in-One segment, the subject is especially sensitive, since printer acquisition pricing is low, with profits derived mainly from a steady stream of revenue from sales of ink cartridges.
The idea of using ink printers goes back many decades, but the consumer ink-jet market traces back to the late 1980s. Canon Inc. began manufacturing its first color ink-jet printers--then and still called "Bubble Jet" printers--at this time. Wirth Consulting's Terry Wirth visited Canon Inc. in Tokyo, Japan, in the early 1990s--a time when Canon, debating the merits of its Laser Beam Product (LBP) printing versus Bubble Jet printing, had pitted one engineering group against the other in order to determine the best imaging solution. Terry was told by Canon executives that the ink-jet printer was the result of a happy accident: a Japanese engineer accidentally placed a hot soldering iron on the tip of a syringe filled with ink and the ink squirted out.
Hewlett-Packard also began developing ink-jet printing technology at this time. One of the biggest challenges for both companies was preventing ink from drying and clogging in the ink nozzles. HP's first ink-jet printer for consumer use was the DeskJet, a black-and-white printer that it launched in 1988 and sold for $1,000. The early 1990s saw the emergence of color ink-jet printers, for instance, HP's DeskJet 500C. Other developers included Epson Inc. of Japan, which developed a variant of ink-jet technology, Micro Piezo imaging. From these beginnings, we now have an ink-jet printer market estimated at $45 billion annually (including ink and media), according to market-research firm LYRA Research.
Today, HP is the big gun in the market, with well-over 50 percent of market share, followed by Lexmark with approximately 20 percent. Since its introduction of the DeskJet in 1988, HP has been in the consumer ink-jet market the longest. Within the market, the more recent trend has been expanding the printer with other functions--namely with wireless connectivity, and copy, scan and fax. These devices are today known as All-in-Ones. With All-in-Ones, users benefit from a smaller product footprint, lower energy consumption versus multiple devices, and there's just one device to manage and maintain. While color laser printers have become more affordable in the last years (we still remember one of the first desktop color laser printers, which was priced at $10,000 ), ink-jet printers still beat them on photographic image quality and the ability to produce archival photos on special photo paper.
Fast forward to 2007, when Eastman Kodak entered the market with eight color All-in-Ones. Since 2007, Kodak has been aggressively marketing the claim that its All-in-Ones are less expensive to run than competitors. Indeed, it went so far to say that U.S. consumers "overpaid" for ink by $5 billion in 2008. In one memorable ad, a Kodak spokesperson displays photos printed by a Kodak All-in-One, and then displays a far smaller number of photos printed by a competitive system for the same ink-cost price. One thing that Kodak doesn't mention is that its ink-jet All-in-Ones utilize a two-cartridge system: a black ink cartridge, and a color ink-cartridge, the latter of which contains three color ink colors--cyan, magenta and yellow--required to produce color images. Most other vendors have discarded this two-cartridge system, instead designing printers that use more cost-effective separate cartridges for each color, so that users replace only the ink cartridge that runs out. With a cartridge containing three colors, one color may run out, but there may still remain ink for the other colors, which usually results in wasted ink.
HP has hit back hard against Kodak's claims. In a November 2009 Nielsen Homescan Custom Research study that was sponsored by HP and queried 15,437 respondents, 36-percent of Kodak printer owners reported that they had a problem with their printer which required that they either:
- Call technical support.
- Have the printer repaired.
- Have a part replaced.
- Return the printer for a refund or exchange.
Within that 36 percent, 28 percent of respondents reported that they required a repair, part replacement, or refund. The Nielsen study may be accessed here.
Now it seems a push is underway to disclose the actual amount of ink contained in cartridges (currently they're exempt from such laws). As it stands, vendors now state an estimated number of actual pages that the cartridge is capable of printing using the guidelines set forth in ISO/IEC 19752 and ISO/IEC 19798 standards, which state how to determine monochrome and color laser printer page yields.
Does Ink Quantity Matter?
Wirth Consulting believes that it's actually more important to know a cartridge's page yield, rather than how much ink is contained in a cartridge. This is because some printers utilize ink more efficiently. For example, an ink-jet printer that has superior dot control (control over how a droplet of ink is placed on the paper), and that more accurately places smaller dots of ink on a page will use less ink to print a particular page than a printer that wastes ink through undisciplined ink usage by sloppily applying larger dots of ink. In this scenario, the cartridge that holds less ink can in theory produce more printed pages than a cartridge that holds more ink.
The bottom line is that the quantity of ink in a cartridge has significantly less meaning than the actual pages that they yield when tested under the same conditions (print settings, test target, etc.), all of which are addressed in the SO/IEC 19752 and ISO/IEC 19798 standards.
While we don't know yet whether printer vendors will be forced to disclose the actual amount of ink contained in their cartridges, they do publish the ink yield obtained under controlled conditions using the ISO industry standards, and we believe that's the most important. To help in achieving the most savings, following is Wirth Consulting's advice:
- Since color ink-jet printers and All-in-Ones are relatively inexpensive, don't shop on price. It's far more cost-effective to invest in a reliable printer or All-in-One than to purchase a $30 printer that won't last, or doesn't have the capabilities you need. Today, whether in the office or at home, usually multiple people are sharing the device, so network connectivity for sharing is essential. We prefer wireless connectivity for wireless sharing among users, enabling you a lot more discretion in where the device will be set up. Since you'll probably be printing color photos and/or color graphics, cheaper devices may not provide the image quality you really need. For color photo printing, you'll need software for correcting common photo problems, for instance, correcting red-eye effects, over- or under-exposed photos, etc. For instance, Hewlett-Packard software even enables you to correct older, faded photos that you've scanned into the system. If you like to scrapbook and create photo albums, there's also software to help you organize and manage photos.
- Purchase the vendor's highest-yield ink cartridges. While these are more expensive, you get a higher page yield per dollar, and the lowest cost per page. Keep in mind, too, that while low-yield ink cartridges are less expensive, you'll be replacing them more often, which means you'll be paying more for the additional shipping, or for the cost of gas and your time when you have to drive to the brick-and-mortar store to purchase them.
- Devices that use separate ink cartridges--one cartridge each for black, cyan, yellow and magenta--are the more cost effective, because you replace only the color that runs out. The worst scenario is discarding an all-in-one cartridge because only one ink has run out.
- Determine your ink costs per page using the following formula:
(Black ink price/Black ink yield)+(Cyan Ink Price/Cyan Ink Yield)+(Magenta Ink Price/Magenta Ink Yield)+(Yellow Ink Price/Yellow Ink Yield)= Cost Per Page
Note that if the device does not use separate color cartridges (instead, three colors are contained within one cartridge), it's unlikely that your real cost per page will match the calculation above because, in reality, you'll likely be forced to throw away unused ink when only one color has been depleted.