Lease or Buy? Which Solution Is the Best Fit for Your Company’s Print Needs?
November 27th, 2019 by Brian Courtney
The economy is rising, yet the affordable housing market is down; car and truck sales are down, and personal computer and corporate server sales are down. What’s up with that?
A significant contributing factor to those current downward sales trends is that people and businesses use a much different approach than was standard a decade ago to acquire and pay for assets. Examples include office space, vacation accommodations, or personal residence (think WeWork, AirBnB, Apartments.com); modes of transportation (Uber, Lyft, Lime); and personal and corporate communication technology (Netflix, Office 365, AWS).
Owning and managing physical and digital assets – like real estate, vehicles, hardware, software, and content – is no longer always the best option. We’ve basically moved into a subscription-based “as a service” economy, with many of our assets and activities linked to the cloud, including print solutions.
BUY OR LEASE YOUR PRINT SOLUTION?
That’s why, when considering whether to buy or lease your company’s printers, you should understand these four important aspects of successfully fulfilling all of your corporate printing needs:
- Upfront capital – Cash flow is always a prime concern. As a new company launches or an established enterprise grows to the next level, there’s also a need for capital investment, so it’s important to make sure you balance your short- and long-term capital distribution. In most cases for a business, the initial cost to enter a lease is significantly less than the purchase price of a copy and print management solution.
- Flexibility – With a business printer lease, you can adjust your system to meet your needs. A managed copy and print solution lets you keep your equipment up-to-date. You obtain the most recent business applications and help secure your printers and network from emerging data breach threats. You also can better meet the future needs of all of your increasingly-mobile stakeholders.
- Monthly Expenses – With a lease for your printers, you do not absorb the impact of asset depreciation or pay the interest on a purchase financing plan. Therefore, a lease allows for a lower monthly payment and provides upgrade options when the agreement period expires – or sooner if needed.
- Maintenance and Repair – Any piece of mechanical equipment requires regular maintenance (and perhaps occasional repair) to function properly. Is the distraction and annoyance of properly maintaining your printers really what you want your team to focus on instead of what they do best to achieve your business goals? No, it’s not. With a managed print solution, your team stays focused on your business and brand, while behind the scenes your print solution vendor focuses on keeping your team’s printing needs available – without disrupting productivity and causing severe stress.
GOOD SENSE SOLUTION BASED ON BENEFITS
In a world where so many of the top-tier specialized assets, products, and services are all available for a subscription, it increasingly makes good business sense to seriously consider the many benefits a managed print solution offers: simple and affordable financial investment, newer equipment, stronger security, and proactive print solution management.
If you’re not sure your current or intended new printing system best meets your business goals moving forward, contact us to learn more about a managed printing solution supported by the industry-leading IT experts at Van Ausdall & Farrar.
Posted in: Insights from VAF Blog, Print
