Keeping Printing Costs In Check
With print volumes reaching as high as 4,000 pages per month, education service provider I CAN READ had been grappling with high printing costs for several years now. The company, which has about 150 employees in Singapore, has been conducting English literacy classes for young children and primary school pupils for the past 15 years. Until recently, it has been depending on leased printers to generate workrelated reports in 24 enrichment centres located across the island. To rein in printing costs that had been increasing as its business grew, I CAN READ needed a more sustainable way to meet its printing needs. Kevin Zeng, regional operations manager at I CAN READ, says the company prefers printers that can offer a good balance between print quality and cost. “A key challenge we face is high printing costs, and if the printer is of a lower cost, the quality of printouts tends to be poor as well,” he says. After-sales service and repair lead time are important too, along with print speeds. “Lower print speeds can hinder us when we print in large quantities from time to time,” Zeng says. While at an Epson showroom, Zeng and his team tested the Epson WorkForce Pro WF-R8591, and decided to pick up the printer which features a Replaceable Ink Pack System (RIPS). RIPS technology has been proven to offer cost savings while enabling businesses to centralise their printing needs and maintain a lower inventory of consumables. Compared to traditional ink cartridges, RIPS uses high capacity ink packs that can hold a far higher volume of ink. This enables the Epson WF-R8591 to deliver a high page yield of up to 75,000 pages without having to replace the ink. The Epson WF-R8591 has been working out well so far. The printer is now being used for everyday printing – from drafts to final copies – by some 35 people at I CAN READ’s headquarters. More importantly, Zeng says the company’s colour printing costs are now lower than that of leased machines. “The cost of ownership is reasonable and the Epson WF-R8591 has been a dependable machine thus far. It also offers a good balance between cost and quality. With the lower cost per print and the good mileage we were getting from each ink pack, we were surprised that the print quality was suitable for our needs,” he says. Indeed, the high print quality