Last blog we talked about a process review conducted as part of a production scanning replacement. In today's article we are going to talk about a fairly simple MFP replacement that took almost a year to complete but which ended in the client being led to complete a good product and performance analysis.
Scenario 
This client runs several accounting offices and has generally standardized on Kyocera 4200 laser printers for the bulk of their printing needs. The reasoning behind them (they gradually have replaced a fleet or older HP printers) was the speed, reliability and the low toner costs due to the long life drum design of the printers. Over a number of orders they have replaced almost all of their printers with these models.
The new need, identified almost a year ago, was for a replacement scanner printer to use for scan to email, scan to storage and as a back up printer. They did not need fax on the device however if it came with fax then they would just accept that as a long term potential for replacing their current fax.
Letter & legal only
Another key feature of their need was the requirement for only letter and legal capability. They have not used ledger at all in their operations so the need for this larger format was required. This led them to looking at the letter legal capable models (A4 is the common industry term for these referring to the metric size for letter paper.) We are seeing that this is a common trend as A4 products become more robust and faster offices are often replacing ledger capable (A3 in industry terms) with the smaller format devices.
Our sales rep provided them with two model choices which could fit their needs, The M3040 and the M2035 which are A4 models which do not have fax although there are matching models for each one in the lineup that do include fax standard.
Option
Due to price point pressures previously we had quoted the client a Samsung SCX5935 which is an A4 MFP which suits small offices very well. This quotation was revisited and updated as part of the new renewed investigation.
Result and purchase
Once everything was considered and analysed projecting usage over an expected 150,000 page life cycle (determined by the client) the decision was to go with the Kyocera M3040. The stated reasons were the experience with the Kyocera printers, the functionality of the document feeder and the projected cost savings due to the large toner cartridge and low per page cost.
The significance of this decision should not be overlooked. Of the three models being considered in this situation the highest priced model is the M3040 when only capital cost is the decision factor. It is also the fastest rated model of the three. By factoring in the other considerations the long term volume adjusted analysis meant that the more costly model actually ended up costing less over the term of use.
While this case, at this point, only involves a single device the analysis can hold true over a much larger fleet of devices and it illustrates how important looking at your total needs can be in making a print device decision.
How much analysis do you do on these kinds of purchases? Can you predict your true needs over time?
Share your experience.
Lee K
