Local man goes green with ink cartridge recycling business

[Anonymous]

Local man goes green with ink cartridge recycling business

HARRISBURG —Though Harrisburg resident Jim Milligan has been working with printers and photocopy machines for almost three decades, his business has changed somewhat over time.

Milligan, who always seems to have a smile on his face and a joke to share, has decided to go green with his business by focusing his work on the recycling of printer ink cartridges, which Americans throw away by the millions every year, according to Milligan.

Milligan was introduced to the business of working with photocopy machines by former Daily Register/Daily Journal Production Manager Jack Larkin, who passed away in November of last year.

Milligan said even though he had limited knowledge of the business at the time, Larkin asked him to do some repair work on one of the newspaper’s printing presses in the early 1980s.

“I got into this business because of Jack Larkin,” Milligan said.

After that, Milligan moved more into the business of repairing photocopy machines. However, he soon realized business was booming in the ink toner cartridge business, so he again changed course with his work. For 25 years, Milligan remanufactured toner cartridges and resold them at a discounted price.

Milligan said “they work just as well” as a brand new cartridge, but cost less.

After doing some research, Milligan discovered that most toner cartridges can be refilled with ink and used again, sometimes up to five times. However, according to Milligan’s research, around seven hundred million ink cartridges that could be recycled are thrown into landfills every year in the United States alone.

“If you’re throwing them away you’re just filling up the landfills,” he said.

So, once again, Milligan adapted his business to fit growing environmental concerns about ink cartridges. Now, he is selling recycled toner cartridges at a 20 to 40 percent discount when compared to a brand new cartridge. As an added bonus, when a customer purchases a toner cartridge, he picks up their empty ones and donates them to Harrisburg schools. The schools then send them to organizations that pay the schools for the empty cartridges, which then get remanufactured and used again.

“I can save you 30 percent and there’s a two-year warranty so why not give it a shot?” Milligan said.

The remanufactured toner cartridges he sells are the only ones available with a two-year warranty, he said. In addition, all of Milligan’s products are made in the United States, providing jobs to many Americans.

Milligan has already sold around 1,500 cartridges so far this year and says his business continues to grow. In addition, he continues to do some work repairing printers and photocopy machines, so he tends to stay busy focusing his work on sales and good customer service. Milligan is also an advocate of the “Shop Saline County First” movement and hopes other residents start supporting local business, too.

[Author]

August 14, 2012 at 7:52 AM