Understanding Reasons For The Cost Of OEM Printer Inks

2011-01-07

Your search for printer inks to use in your home or office printer will likely be confounded by high prices. If you stick to the OEM ink your printer's manufacturer made, your wallet will suffer even more, and there's no getting around that.

While you'd think that the people who made your printer could at the very least create supplies for it that aren't exceedingly costly, this is a gross misconception that couldn't be further from the truth. In reality, OEM ink cartridges are the most expensive options available no matter where you go. Whether you get your OEM inks directly from the manufacturer or through a second-hand supplier, the high prices they start out with will leave you paying in droves.

Printer manufacturers don't specialize in ink creation. Although they do have some idea of what they're doing, their focus is really the engineering that goes into the office machinery itself. As a result they do not invest as much money into producing ink in large volumes, forcing them to be selective about what they do make and sell. For the end customer, this translates to higher prices on manufacturer inks, even for business consumers who buy in volume.

Because printer makers don't devote as much attention for creating new printer inks just for ink's sake, they sometimes tailor what they do produce to specific printer models. OEM ink that was designed for a certain type or family of machinery will produce less consumer demand, as not all customers and end users have that target printer. This kind of market structure only leads to further increases in manufacturer prices.

One clear reason that OEM inks are so expensive is that more resources are used in their creation. Ink refills are easy to use, and allow you to recycle your old cartridges, whereas each OEM package you buy comes complete with a new plastic shell that the manufacturer has to create, transport and sell at higher prices.

The final reason why printer inks you find from online vendors will always beat OEM ink when in terms of pricing is that these inks are marketed with entirely different philosophies. Printer manufacturers often raise their ink prices to make up for any losses their machinery sales led to, reasoning that by selling consumables at a higher rate, they can profit. This is just business, but the flip side of the coin is that in recent years, third-party ink sellers and cartridge refilling services have jumped in to fill the void. By providing quality ink at lower prices, these new players keep offices and private concerns supplied through cheaper cartridge refills and bulk sales.