“How much would this label cost to produce” is one of the
most common questions I get. From my
experience, the reason prospects and resellers ask this question frequently is
that most people believe color costs significantly more than monochrome.
But now, color and images are required in more and more
labels. For example, the UN initiative,
Global Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS)
requires labels to include pictograms and icons of different colors.
In addition, many manufacturers find producing color labels
on demand reduces costs when compared to purchasing preprinted color labels.
Given the need to produce color labels on demand, I decided (with
the assistance of Andy Scherz, Product Manager, Epson) to review the costs of
producing labels on color laser printers versus the Epson ColorWorks label
printers, TM-C3400 and the GP-C831.
For the top three printers, I gathered the ISO 19798 Standard
Page Yield for these printers. This
standard established the process to determine standard page yields to enable
product comparisons. To learn about ISO
standard page yields, check out these summaries:
To determine yields, companies like HP and Dell print the
same 5 defined standard test pages in replicated trials until the cartridges
are depleted. Check out these images:
To determine costs, I divided the price per cartridge by the
yield. I got both the costs and yield
information from the respective company’s website. From this number, I calculated the cost per
MSI (thousand square inch). I wanted to
get to a cost per MSI to compare the laser printers to both the TM-C3400 and
GP-C831.
To fill this printer with toner, it costs $872!!
For the Lexmark C748 de (http://www1.lexmark.com/en_US/products/brochures/c748-brochure.pdf), the cost per MIS was $0.99.
For the Lexmark C792
de (http://www1.lexmark.com/US/en/catalog/product.jsp?prodId=6395), the cost per MSI was $1.01.
To determine the yield for both the TM-C3400 and the GP-C831
printers, Andy Scherz ran all 5 images through the estimation tool Epson has
available for each printer. I understand
that Epson did not actually print the images until the cartridges were
depleted; but the analysis is a good representation of the final results.
For the TM-C3400, the cost per MSI was $0.68.
The TM-C3400 was up to 1/3 less cost per MIS than standard
color lasers printers. Plus, the
TM-C3400 uses roll or flat fan feed, which is significantly more reliable than
sheet fed media handling used by the laser printers. Finally, the TM-C3400 includes the capability
to print one label at a time, instead of an entire sheet, reducing wasted labels.
The GP-C831 was even less expensive, with a cost per MSI of
$0.24.
The GP-C831 uses pin-fed media, one of the most reliable
media feed technologies available. The
GP-C831 is perfect for producing 8” x 11” drum labels for the chemical industry
to meet the GHS requirements.
Overall, this analysis show the significant cost advantage
of using color inkjet printers to produce on-demand color labels when compared
to laser printers.
If you or your customers are using laser printers currently
to produce labels, consider moving to one of the Epson inkjet printers. You’ll save lots of money while getting
outstanding and durable print quality as well as outstanding media handling.
Guy Mikel
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