WILL PRINTER & PRINTER SUPPLY SALES EVER RECOVER ?

Are
printers and printing supplies going the way of other outmoded
technologies like external modems and tape backups — destined to pile
up in some forgotten IT closet somewhere?
That’s the scenario that
has some in the industry closely watching earnings announcements from
companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Lexmark and Xerox.The question is,
are the huge sales drop offs in printing and supplies by these
companies caused by the recession, or is there a bigger trend at work? 
Is the move towards green computing and doing more with less driving
some companies to re-evaluate their printing practices?Angela
O’Donnell, owner of New York City-based solution provider W. O’Donnell
Consulting, says that company gate keepers from CFOs to office managers
are casting a more watchful eye on the printing supplies purchased and
used.  “As a function of the recession a big piece of the business that
wasn’t looked at too hard was printing expenses, says O’Donnell.  “Now
businesses are looking at every single expense.”

Resource Library:
For
example, she notes, some of her customers are changing the way that
drivers are installed at their site so that certain groups within the
company can only print in monotone and not in color anymore. That’s
translated into a big drop off in color toner sales for her company.And
O’Donnell says that office managers are no longer stocking up on
supplies. They are working with more of a just-in-time stocking
process.“I do think this will become a permanent change,” says
O’Donnell.  “It will change what people think about the things they
really need and how they need to work.”

HP’s CEO Mark Hurd
disagrees, saying that the changes to the printing business right now
are “cyclical rather than secular.”  Answering analysts questions
during HP’s earnings conference call this week, Hurd told them that
digital printing content is growing.“So the cyclical stuff that we’re
seeing right now…is based on GDP and unemployment,” Hurd says. “…Is
there some big secular change in printing? Secular changes occur over
years and decades and over very long periods.”However, Hurd points out,
HP is also hedging its bets. He says that home photo printing makes up
less than 10 percent of the company’s supplies revenue, but that
business is shifting to the web and to retail locations.“[That’s] one
of the reasons you see HP investing in Snapfish,” Hurd says. “It’s one
of the reasons why you see HP investing in retail photo kiosks,” which
use HP supplies.

But some think the drop off in printing
hardware and supply sales is more a function of the recession than
anything else, and will pick up again when the economy is humming once
again.”There have been a ton of layoffs and therefore less folks
printing,” says Becky Connolly, director of computer and imaging
supplies and accessories at Technology Integration Group, a Torrance,
Calif.-based solution provider.  “I have found a surplus of printers at
my clients’ sites due to closing of facilities.”But Connolly believes
that’s temporary. While companies are looking to operate more
efficiently and looking towards green practices, sales will come back
when employment does.“I see a lot of companies evaluating in this
space, and I feel more devices will be sold, once they go through what
they have and what can still be used energy efficiently,” she says.
“When people are employed they print.”