Express the costs of consumables (over $12,100) to operate printer services offered for free to Chem majors, over a period of 1.5 years. Does not include the cost of the $2.5K printer itself.
Summary
Consumables = (Ink + maintenance kits) + paper = $10,200 + $1,930 = $12,130 over 35 months.
This comes to about $4,160/year.
Data and analysis
Page counts |
Dates |
Count of |
Avg pages per months |
At 1.53 cents/ page, |
At 0.36 cents/ page, |
Cost for both |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
300,000 |
May 2011 - Nov 2012 |
19 months |
15,000 pages /month |
$4,585 |
$1,080 |
$5,670 |
240,000 |
Dec 2012 - Feb 2014 |
14 months |
16,000 pages/ month |
$3,665 |
$865 |
$4,530 |
Total: 540,000 |
May 2011 - Feb 2014 |
33 months |
15,430 pages/ month |
$8,250 |
$1,945 |
$10,200 |
Hardware costs, including "consumable" maintenance kits
Printer's initial cost, including 3 year warranty: $2,500
- Amortizing cost of printer over 540K pages printed comes to 0.46 cents per page.
Cost for maintenance kits, up to now: $1,945
- 10 have been installed for the most recent 240,000 pages, at $86.40 each: $864 + $1 = $865
- Thus estimate we 1.25 additional kits (~12.5 kits) for the first 300K pages printed: $1,080
Thus, $4,445 spent so far on hardware, including maintenance kits.
Ink cost calculations
Total ink costs: $8,250
Usage Dec 2012 - Feb 2014
Ink Stick color |
Use |
6 Sticks per package |
Cost per package |
Total costs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Cyan |
28 |
4.67 |
$69.65 |
$325.26 |
Magenta |
24 |
4.00 |
$69.65 |
$278.60 |
Yellow |
22 |
3.67 |
$69.65 |
$255.62 |
Black |
76 |
12.67 |
$221.40 |
$2,805.14 |
|
|
|
Total ink costs for 240K pages: |
$3,665 |
- $3,665 for 240,000 pages comes to 1.53 cents per page, on average.
- Thus, estimate that an additional 300,000 pages used previously (1.25 as much again) would cost about $4,585.
Paper costs
Cost for paper, up to now: $1,930
- 0.575 cents per page, if buying cheap and you don't care about the environment.
- Total of 335,000 sheets of pater used.
- 149,000 paper sheets used for 240,000 pages printed.
- Thus estimate that an additional 186,000 paper sheets used for previous 300,000 pages printed.
Paper purchase cost options
0.575 cents/ page for Staples® Copy Paper, LETTER-Size, 92/104 US/Euro Brightness, 20 lb., 8 1/2" x 11", 5,000 Sheets/Ct (if $28.77 for 5000 sheets).
1.03 cents / page for Staples® 30% Recycled Copy Paper, LETTER-size, 92/104 US/Euro Brightness, 20 lb., 8 1/2"H x 11"W, 5,000 Sheets/Ct ($51.59 for 5000 sheets)
- Contains at least 10% post-consumer recycled content
0.67 cents/ Staples® 100% Recycled Copy Paper, LETTER-size, 92/104 US/Euro Brightness, 20 lb., 8 1/2"H x 11"W, 5,000 Sheets/Ct ($33.43 for 5000 sheets)