Summer Safety Tips

Summer is officially here.  This is easy for me to remember because we celebrate our twins birthday on Summer equinox.  With summer come warmer temperatures, which I really felt yesterday for the first time this year.  Like any other liquid, ink becomes more fluid and tends to expand in the heat.  The combination of heat and ink cartridges can potentially mean disaster for the interior of your car.  So we just want to remind you to not leave your ink cartridges, full or empty, for an extended period in your car on these hot summer days.  Plan ahead of time, or take them with you as you are running errands.  Toner and high temperatures are not a good combination as well.  Toner particles will begin to fuse together at around 105 to 110 degrees Fahrenheit.  This will cause streaks in your prints and diminished cartridge life.  So you will also want to quickly move your toner cartridges from your vehicle to room temperature for storage.  We pack our toner cartridges in foil bags to protect the photosensitive drums from harmful light.  So once toner cartridges are put on your shelf and the temperature is maintained, they can safely be stored for many years.  Our refilled ink cartridges can be stored safely for at least 6 months.  However, we have tested several cartridges that have been stored for a year and a half and more.  So remember these tips and your summer will be that much more enjoyable!

Do you have any comments or direct-experiences with this?  We would love to hear them.

Baseball Sweepstakes

Just wanted to let you know about Cartridge World's most recent promotion.  Visit the link below before July 18th, 2010 and register to win 2 airline tickets, 2 nights hotel, and 2 tickets to see the Major League Team of your choice!  No purchase necessary.  Just our way of saying thank you for being our customer with America's favorite pass-time.  Other prizes include signed team merchandise and free ink for a year (value of $500)!  You can't win if you don't play!  So jump on this link today--you have absolutely nothing to lose.

Click Here to Register for the Baseball Sweepstakes

HP Is In My Doghouse

Last week I wrote about the importance of getting good advice before buying your next printer.  Today I need to vent.  Whatever printer you do decide to buy--DO NOT BUY AN HP PRINTER.  Just say "no" to HP.  However, to be more specific, HP is still our recommendation for laser printers--both color and monochrome, just do not buy an HP inkjet printer.  For years HP has been the dominant player in printer hardware and they have the largest market share to boot.  Most people buy an HP ink printer believing it is of higher quality.  My how times change.  HP has fallen on hard times.  They are posting losses almost every quarter and recently laid off about 9,000 workers (only 3% of their workforce).  Apparently, they are blaming these hard times on us, the aftermarket industry, because they are fighting us tooth and nail.  This is very apparent in their new series of inkjet printers.  These cartridges are almost as bad as Lexmark's Prebate program cartridges.  Although they are easy to refill the problems only begin once the cartridge is inserted.  The chips are highly encrypted, which is evident in the slow development of replacement chips by the aftermarket.  In addition, the cartridges that do not have chips, but have gold colored contacts are designed to be used only once.  This has always been the case, but older cartridges could be refilled 6 to 8 times and still produce high quality prints without rejection by the printer.  That is no longer the case with this new generation of HP cartridges.  They will simply shut down when the internal counter reaches X number of prints.  The printer "does not recognize the cartridge", or warns you to "check the cartridge".  If you own an HP printer and use refilled cartridges you have seen these messages.  It is our policy to provide the customer with a new replacement cartridge--no questions asked.  However, you may have more difficulty getting an exchange or reimbursed from online retailers or other local remanufacturers.  Either way, it is a frustrating experience.  Just what HP ordered.  Now you are forced to buy new HP branded cartridges.  Here is another trend HP does not tell you about... these new generation of cartridges hold less ink and are more expensive than "older" HP cartridges.  That is also the trend with toner cartridges.  However, you still have many good options.  Thrift stores carry many older printers that are gems at the bargain price of $5 to $15 dollars.  Canon and Brother now offer several printers that are very refill friendly.  In many situations it makes more sense to upgrade to a monochrome laser printer, many of which can be purchased for less than $100.  There are tons of great deals available on refurbished laser printers, which usually include 30 to 90 day guarantees and give you ample time to discover any potential problems.  Another advantage of laser printers is the availability and price of replacement parts.  A quality laser printer can last 10 years or more with very heavy usage.  This is not the case with inkjet printers.  They are just disposable.  In short, do not buy HP inkjet printers right now.  I hope they change their philosophy as they lose more and more business to other manufacturers.  As long as HP fails to acknowledge that a large percentage of their customer base wishes to use recycled cartridges and that the aftermarket industry is a permanent player, they are going to continue to struggle.

Amazing How Time Flies!

I almost forgot we had a blog it has been so long. My apologies. I just wanted to post a short update to the state of the aftermarket industry. We are facing several challenges, which always provide several opportunities. HP, Canon, Lexmark, Epson and the other major OEM's (original equipment manufacturer) are becoming more and more agressive in their tactics to gain market share and discourage people from using refilled/remanufactured printer cartridges. No longer is it the case that you can run to Wal-Mart and choose any printer, usually the cheapest, and get your cartridges refilled once they are empty. These new generation of cartridges are very problematic at times because of the amount of information that is stored in their binary codes, and the constant updates and new firmwares that are being sent to your printer almost daily. It is frustrating to us as remanufacturers because the industry is doing all it can to prevent these problems, but more importantly, it is frustrating to you and to anyone who is interested in buying refilled cartridges versus buying new. The OEM's are doing their customers a great disservice by making it so difficult. They are failing to recognize that a large percentage of their customers are not interested in buying new cartridges, but would rather do the environmentally friendly option, and the most economical option of having their cartridges refilled. For this reason, we ask you to please consult with us or someone else in the know, who can help you make the best decision when buying your next printer. There are many printers available right now at very reasonable prices that are refill friendly, cost effective to use, and easy to use. Laser printers are probably a wiser alternative now than they have ever been. Please let us know how we can help you make the most informed decision so that your next printer is one that you will be happy with for many years to come. Thank you again for being our customer and for supporting us. We truly appreciate you.

November $50 Gas Card Winner...

Kimara Thompson was the winner of this month's gas card drawing--congratulations!! And now with falling gas prices (now less than $2 a gallon at some valley locations!) this $50 card could possibly last for two fill-ups! I know the price of refilling my Chevy HHR has gone from almost $60 dollars per fill-up to just over $30 now!! My only fear is now that gas is "cheap" we will all return to our old gas-guzzling habits and prices will skyrocket once again. Hopefully, we have all learned a few lessons from the recent gouging and maybe we will continue to carpool more often or ride our bikes when possible. I'm sure the current economy will discourage people from running out and buying new Hummers--so hopefully driving smaller more efficient cars will be a new trend for the near future. If we all do our part in conserving where we can it will make a huge difference! I also think if everyone were to drive those couple extra miles to the cheapest gas station in town it would force the local gas station prices to be more competitive. Anyways... congratulations Kimara!!

Printer Recommendations...

Today it was my saturday to work in the store. And as I was driving home I was noticing the bright red and yellow colors in the Wellsville Mountains - and I realized fall is upon us. It truly felt like autumn today as it was cloudy all day and we even had a few minutes of rain and it was definately cooler. Cache Valley is a beautiful place to live year-round, but the autumn and spring seasons are my favorite. This is a wonderful place to live.

Anyways, I apologize that I have not posted anything recently. In our last email newsletter we sent out a couple of recommendations for home business/small business laser printers. As always, HP is our first recommendation. For many reasons: their print quality is unmatched, their consumables are reasonably priced, and they are good cartridges for refilling and remanufacturing. So in an effort to better serve our customers needs we have begun to sell some used laser printers - and we have had a great response in the last week. The biggest selling point is the savings in cost per page versus inkjet printers. Depending on the cartridges you can cut your cost per page from $0.05 per page or higher to $0.01 to $0.02 per page by switching to a laser printer and using remanufactured cartridges. If you are doing a lot of text or just black printing - this can be a very significant amount of savings! And you don't need to get rid of your inkjet printer, but you can hold onto it and only use it when you do need color prints or other functions. Our printers range from $70 to $99 dolors and include your first remanufactured cartridge (a $40 to $60 value). They also include a full 30 day warranty in case something should go wrong. But even if you do not buy from us, let us know what your needs are, what you are currently using and we can calculate your cost per page and your potential savings by upgrading to a laser printer.

We'd like to thank all our loyal customers for your continued business. We truly appreciate the opportunity to serve your needs. Please let us know if there is anyway we can improve your experience with us. We hope you all have a tremendous weekend!!

Mountainside Elementary Fundraiser Program...

I'm sure all of you mom's out there are grateful to send your kids back to school this week! We are grateful to Mountainside Elementary, the new elementary in Mendon, to participate in their fundraising this year. There will be cartridge collection bins located in each classroom, as each of the classes will be competing against each other to raise the most money each month. The winning class will get to wear their pajamas to school and get an ice cream buffet or a breakfast reward provided by different sponsors. They are raising money with cartridges, box tops, milk caps etc. Cartridge World offers a couple of different ways of participating in this program. The kids or parents can bring their empty cartridges and place them in the school bins. Or customers can bring in their cartridges to be refilled at our retail location, mention the fundraiser, and we will apply $1 to the classroom of your choice. Once again, thank you Mountainside Elementary for allowing us to partner with you in raising additional money for the school. We enjoy serving the businesses, schools, and residents of this great community. We understand that printer cartridges are not your number one concern, however, we love saving you money that you can spend on gas, or utilities, or cell phones, or whatever you need a little extra money for.