Printers innovate in tough climate

By Nicola Mawson for Epson

Johannesburg, 29 Jun 2009

Printer sales have declined by about 20% since a year ago, with sales of inkjet printers taking more market share away from more costly laser printers.

Mark Hiller, Lexmark SA MD, says IDC figures for the first quarter to March last year showed annualised sales of a million units in SA, two-thirds of which were inkjets. In the first quarter of this year, however, annualised sales dropped to an expected 800 000, and three-quarters were inkjets.

Hiller says printer sales have slowed. “There has been a decline; you can see it in the numbers.” Corporations and government departments are hanging onto printers, while consumers have moved to value, he notes.

Multifunction printer sales are also growing faster than other categories because of the perceived value.

Lexmark has introduced innovations to aid customers, especially as one in six pages printed is never read, says Hiller. One function that can be activated is the confidential print, which requires an access card to be swiped before the document prints. Another is a function that sends the documents to the user's location.

Hiller says these functions cut down on the number of pages that are not collected at printers. There has also been a shift towards outsourcing printing, which gives companies better total cost of ownership, he explains.

Pay per page

Thierry Boulanger, imaging and printing country manager for HP SA, says the unit is “not immune to the economic crisis”. He says micro businesses are now moving spend into retail and away from resellers, and purchasing decisions are made on value and price.

Corporations are sweating their assets and there has been a shift to the managed print service environment, with companies wanting to pay per page, Boulanger notes.

In response, HP has launched outlets called HP Print Stations. The company now has 14 outlets with a target of 40 by year-end. Boulanger says, as people are printing less at home, it is now offering a managed services environment where they can print what they want on the printer of their choice.

He adds the outlets are “seeing pages printed per month growing dramatically”. The company is also looking to capture the informal sector and set up kiosks to service the one-man-bands typically found outside Home Affairs, for example.

Advertising messages have also changed, with consumers being targeted through retailers' broadsheets, and corporations being targeted through advisory councils rather than typical television or radio advertisements, Boulanger says.

Pushing the product

Albert Fayard, national sales and marketing manager at Epson SA, says there is no doubt the environment is not only difficult, but also competitive.

As a vendor, Epson is putting more into marketing. This includes making sure it is included in retailers' advertisements, as well as having a presence on the ground to ensure the product is top of mind for consumer shopping.

Fayard says there is a lot of focus on marketing at the moment. This includes advertisements in broadsheets, as well as having staff on the floor to punt the product. Year-on-year, sales are down a bit, although not dramatically, he adds.

It will be another two to three quarters before companies see an upturn. As a result, space, both in advertising and on the floor, is important. Having the right stock at the right price is also key, he points out.

Consumers are looking for total cost of ownership, which spans beyond just buying a printer, but also to the cost of replacement cartridges and the warranty experience. Consumers are being more careful around printing, especially when it comes to colour printing, he says.

Although fundamentals have not changed from a year ago, consumers have become more value sensitive. “It was a lot easier a year ago.”