Kodak Challenges HP's Printer Sales Model

Radon360 writes "Kodak has decided to attempt to buck the trend set by HP by offering low cost printers and reasonably priced ink cartridges. Three of their new printers start at $149, with ink cartridges costing $9.99 for a black cartridge and $14.99 for a five color cartridge. To counter, HP has announced a release of lower-priced cartridges, though with less ink and they are still more expensive than Kodak's. It will be a matter of time to see whether Kodak can upset the practice of ink cartridge extortion."

Will People Still Seek Cheaper Alternatives?

[gbulmash]

I guess if Kodak doesn't underprice the printers, they won't be as hurt by cartridge remanufacturers and cartridge cloners as the outfits that sell printers at a loss, looking to make it up in ink. Still, even at their low prices... everyone loves a bargain. If someone can profitably undercut Kodak on cartridges or DIY refill kits, will they find that they've just changed the tempo of the game rather than changing the game itself?

Their sales will skyrocket

[ZoOnI]

I will be buying a Kodak if the cost of both toner and printers is low as well as a minimum reliability.

Expensive!

[wwpublishing]

Is it me or does a $15 cartridge sounds expensive. I mean, like you go to a copying a store, and copies are like .03 each. $15 = like 450 pages. One of their ink cartridges can't even print that.

Re:Will People Still Seek Cheaper Alternatives?

[Marc D.M.]

My only issue with this is that the DIY refills are usually messy and of a lower quality than the original.

I'm looking forward to this as it could pave the way for cheaper photo-printing options.

About time!

[Jerry Rivers]

Hurray for Kodak! It appears to be attempting to turn things around and be competitive again after years of lacklustre performance and seemingly rudderless operation. The acquisition of Creo put them in a good position in the prepress workflow biz, and now with this announcement maybe we'll have a reason to buy Kodak again at the consumer level. I look forward to trying one of their printers.

Hope for their success, but...

[catbutt]

I have real doubts they will be able to compete with that model. People's natural tendency is to seek the cheap (or easy) route now, giving far less weight to the long term.

I know I have a hard time bringing myself to, for instance, buy things in larger containers....I know it's cheaper in the long term, but I don't like putting out a bunch of cash now.

I also knowingly do other equally irrational things along the same lines....for instance, if I am standing at one corner of a football field, and have to get to the opposite corner without walking on the field, I will always walk along the long side first. It gets me closer to my destination quicker, even though the overall distance is the same. Irrational, but I can't help it.

Re:Expensive!

[jlarocco]

$15 expensive? A while back I bought an old HP Deskjet for $10 at the flea market, my logic being that if it didn't work it wouldn't be a big deal because I'd enjoy taking it apart. A win, either way. But then I had to buy ink. I ended up spending $80 for black and color, and I'll be shocked if they last to 450 pages. Fortunately the printer works, because I don't think they do refunds on ink.

But anyway, $15 would be pretty sweet given the alternatives.

Vote with your wallet people.....

[budword]

Kodak here I come. I'm tired of large corparations taking advantage of the flock because we ACT like sheep. Put HP printers out of business until they get the message. I believe I read (maybe here) that HP printer cartriges had a chip on them that would report to the computer that they were out of ink, when in fact they were not, to get you to buy another over priced cartrige. Hurt them where it counts, or they will never change. I've been buying canon printers, and canon ink (rather than slightly cheaper 3rd party ink) to try to reward them for not gouging me on the ink. I'll look into kodak next time I need a printer. Now if they have native linux drivers, Kodak would be a done deal. They won't change until we hurt them where it counts. Next time you buy a none HP printer, email them to tell them why you won't buy their stuff anymore. http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/feedbac k.do;jsessionid=GxCTB6m1p2fJcoG63U7U0P1YV8VQVD3QNP 177At6udUrxCMjeG6K!711870732 [hp.com]

Re:Expensive!

[Grishnakh]

Yep, it's a rip-off. Comparing apples to apples, the B/W cartridge is $10. For three times that, I can buy a new toner cartridge for my HP laser printer which will print at least 5,000 pages. I'm sure these Kodak cartridges won't last for 1666 pages.

Plus, toner cartridges don't have to worry about drying out with too little use, like inkjet cartridges do.

The simple fact is that inkjet printing is just a bad idea, no matter what the costs are. It can't compete in any way with laser printing technology, except by using marketing to take advantage of peoples' stupidity and shortsightedness.

They better have a good marketing team

[hcmtnbiker]

Breaking from a paradigms is always hard, but breaking from a paradigm like this one will be near impossible. People don't naturally calculate out what is the best for the amount of time they believe they will own the printer, they don't ever realize that they're tied into buying HPs ink for the rest of thier lives. Kodak will have to have one hell of a marketing team to pull this off.

Re:Will People Still Seek Cheaper Alternatives?

[Kadin2048]

If the price difference between Kodak and the remanufacturers isn't that big, who is going to risk f'ing up their printer prints with garbage remanufactured crap when for a very small bit more they could get guaranteed good OEM ink? I know I wouldn't. It's the huge disparity in pricing right now that drives people to take the risk.

Exactly. Particularly when the printer is $150, and not some $20 piece of garbage that's just a holder for the $40 or $50 cartridge. Nobody cares really about messing up their printer, when you can just get a new one practically for free -- but when the printer is a significant investment, and the replacement cartridges are cheap, who's going to do that? It's penny-wise and pound-foolish at that point to cut corners.

Re:It is not extortion

[iCEBaLM]

I'm pretty sure he was talking about the ink cartridges, not the printer.

HP releases ink cartridge page yield using ISO standard pages at http://www.hp.com/pageyield [hp.com]

Re:Expensive!

[alshithead]

I've been very happy with my HP Laser Jet 2600n. It prints great for our minimal everyday use and seems to be pretty economical for printing large quantity color tri-fold adverts for my wife's business. The print quality is wonderful and the variety of paper types that can be used is excellent. I've got it on a wireless print server by Linksys so all of our computers can use it as the default printer.

I would suggest that anyone using a bubble jet investigate a color laser printer. With the toner recycling promos offered by the office supply stores, replacement toners seem to be a lot less expensive than the little tiny bubble jet replacement cartridges.

If only the RIAA were listening now...

[zappepcs]

If only the RIAA would take a note from this exercise. Both industries have similar problems. I hope that the consumer is the real winner....

Re:Hope for their success, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

People's natural tendency is to seek the cheap (or easy) route now, giving far less weight to the long term

I agree as well but people have been buying these cheap printers and expensive ink for years. I believe the average person knows that the ink is expensive and that is why there is a booming refill market. The majority of people looking for a relatively cheap home ink jet have learned their lesson on their own, a company selling a modle that is the opposite approach will make it more well known.

Re:Kodak? Printers?

[Jerry Rivers]

Kodak has been in the printer business for a long, long time. Though mostly at the enterprise level as far as I know. I remember seeing Kodak-branded laser printers in the 90s.

Why shouldn't they get into new business? Are they supposed to just close up shop because film is dead? And they are nowhere near a "last gasp." Kodak's a big company with many assets. Though they have slumped badly in the last seven years they still rake in $13.5B in sales.

Re:Ink prices

[Jeff DeMaagd]

I really haven't had such significant problems with ink drying like that, and I have left my inkjet printer unused for months at a time. The only special treatment I do is to wrap the printer in a large bag for storage in a closet. Years is silly because if you print that rarely, then you don't need a printer.

For general use, laser is fine, and that's what I use most of the time. Still, for quality photos, I'm not going to pretend that an inexpensive laser is going to do that as well as my inkjet can for picture quality.

BTW, just to add something off the wall, at the one desk I use for printing various things, I have four types of printers associated to just one computer. I can actually justify a fifth printer.

Re:Photo printer copier scanner not a printer

[NETHED]

Thanks for driving the costs up for everyone. A warranty is just that, its not a end-of-life replacement program. I would chide you further, but I know I'll get modded to oblivion anyway.

Re:Will People Still Seek Cheaper Alternatives?

[sphealey]

> Kodak has priced these printers to be
> profitable on the printer sale alone.

And the paper. Kodak make a very nice line of inkjet photo paper which comes in that nicely recognizable yellow box with the red logo - and a price to match. They could easily make their profit on the brand if their more cost-effective printers induce people to buy their photo paper.

sPh

Re:Will People Still Seek Cheaper Alternatives?

[UncleTogie]

It's not like the OEMs have some secret process for making ink.

No more so than Coca-Cola has a secret recipe/process for Coke...

Re:Their sales will skyrocket

[Eskarel]

Yes, but that toner cartridge will usually print out several thousand sheets as opposed to the between 200 and 400 you get from an ink jet, assuming you use it often enough not to get drying or clogging. $100 for 2000 sheets is a hell of a lot better than $30 for 200. Especially when it doesn't dry out or have to get tossed because you haven't printed for two weeks.

Re:Their sales will skyrocket

[Fred_A]

Mod++
Exactly why I switched to laser at home years ago and never looked back. And I'd rather have my photos come out of a Frontier [fujifilm.com] or some such than an inkjet. Ends up being cheaper too.

The industry brings "frugality" upon itself

[Anonymous Coward]

Back in ancient times, we could buy a modem cable for $40 from the local store, OR we could buy the exact same raw 25 conductor ribbon cable and crimp-on connectors (from the same store) for about $15. Total investment of time to save $25: about 5 minutes. The same concept applied to disk drive cables. The quality of the home-made workaround was no worse than the overpriced alternative.

I also remember when you could build your own computer from Taiwanese DIY parts and save about $1000 vs. the same thing (made from the same parts) sold in local stores under various so-called "brand names". You can still build your own computer from individual boards today, but you can't save $1000 doing it.

People do some silly things to save money, because most of the tactics WORK.

I recently bought a laser-based all-in-one unit, even though I would have preferred ink jet. The toner cost is reasonable (because the refill process is simple and effective). I have no intention of buying cheapie refills, because I don't have to. I would have preferred a color ink jet, but I refuse to deal with the outrageous cost of ink.

Re:The printer-ink thing has to crack soon

[petermgreen]

that will stop cartridge cloners, it won't stop builders of inkjet PRINTERS.

patents can make building PRINTERS much harder (witness the fact that there are only a few makers atm) but as the GP said patents have a finite lifetime.

the cartridge chip thing only affects builders of third party carts for existing printers.

Re:Photo printer copier scanner not a printer

[Peeteriz]

Parent said "And I guarantee you that after three years they won't print as they should---just a fact."

      If this is so, then the only problem is that not everyone is bringing these printers back as defective. There is no techical reason not to make devices that survive the warranty period in 95% cases, not 5%.

Re:Will People Still Seek Cheaper Alternatives?

[zakezuke]

My Canon has a separate print head that can be replaced.

So does mine.

But... it's a thermal printhead which will burn out. I estimate 10 cartridge changes on your average ip3000+ model based on canon numbers. Reality is much higher, 15 to 20 in my experence.

Epsons are based on micropiezo technology. Printhead life is rated double or tripple that of canon. It is more prone to clog, but a clog is typicaly not a catastrophic condition, it typicaly can be resolved with blue windex.

It's a question whether you want to employ elbow grease, or throw money at the printer to resolve typical print issues.

Let's not neglect the fact that in the case of canon, the printhead is typicaly 2/3 the cost of the printer, where OEM ink is also about 2/3 the cost of the printer. You may want to keep your printer in service, but replacement is not a bad deal.