Starting A Printing Business, Why I Bought A Konica Minolta

Hopefully this helps some people with taking the leap to purchasing your first printer or machine for your business. Xerox, Konica Minolta, Canon, Ricoh will all deliver you a product that you can sell your customer.

[mako]

Veteran equipment dealer. Xerox would be a distant fourth place finisher well behind Konica, Ricoh and Canon in the production in the office space too. Konica, Ricoh and Canon are by far the top manufacturers with the best equipment.
Dollar Buyout Leases I would advise against as the interest you're paying going that route is very high. You're actually better off doing a Fair Market Value lease and negotiating the buyout with the finance company (note I said finance company) at the end of term IF big IF you want to keep the machine at the end of five years. Your needs five years from now may be totally different.
Most important of all, unless you're the exceedingly rare person who can service their own production copier (basically nobody but a trained professional can properly service these machines), your biggest consideration needs to be your choice of dealer. The choice of dealer is more important than the brand on the front of your printer. When your lease payment is hundreds, a thousand or a couple thousand dollars per month you have to have that machine up and running. You could have the best machine in the world but if the dealer or their technicians are incompetent, far away, or just don't care because they low balled the service contract your down time will be exponentially higher. Often you will find that the dealers quoting the lowest prices also have terrible reputations on the service side. Its not cheap to have competent, factory trained, technicians and product specialists, not to mention have an inventory of parts. Expect the best dealer to not necessarily be the cheapest.
Don't take the salesman's word for be suspect of dealer provided references. Ask around. Talk to your local chamber of commerce or others in the business. . Any reputable dealer will be proud to give you a tour of their entire operation. Its a red flag if you can't go beyond the showroom or especially if their facility is JUST a showroom. Meet the people who run their service department. You'd be surprised how many disreputable copier companies are out there. Also a lot of one man bands that are hiding behind impressive websites.
Used? Only, I repeat ONLY buy a pre-owned machine from a reputable dealer who you know is going to stand behind the machine. WAY. There are also a lot of on-line brokers of used equipment who just want to move a machine and they don't give a rip what happens to you once the machine is sold. Those on line sellers would be a BIG no-way too no matter how impressive their pricing or their websites or claims of being local or partnering with local dealers. RUN. I've got no shortage of horror stories I could tell about businesses who thought they got a good deal on-line for a used copier only to find out they bought a piece of garbage that nobody can fix or that looks good but is actually very old in terms of copiers. Beyond 8 years old you are on borrowed time with any copier manufacturer especially post-covid. If in doubt of the age of the model you will often find a copyright date on the brochure somewhere in the margins.
Lot of info. Hope it helps someone.

[adstractpl]

hi, I recently bought a used Konica Minolta bh c6500, before that I printed a little on the c224e KM. I recommend everyone to buy KM production machines, there is an obvious difference between photocopier machines and a production machine. In Poland, yesterday, on June 4, we celebrated the Day of the Printers. I wish all printers around the world rich orders and great customers. Greetings!

[scottfranco]

I do binding in my garage. I noticed that the office machines I had access to would print high GSM covers, so bought a OKI 9650. It was still viable when I got rid of it, but OKI exited the printer business and would no longer provide support, so after some 15 years it developed a print issue and the repair shops would not touch it. I ended up with a Xerox Versalink C8000. Its a LED bar printer, which means it can do 11x17 300 gsm covers. I even run 11x19 though it in the bypass tray to make full size 8.5x11 bound books. I also bought a Chinese C50 binder, about a knockoff copy of the BQ-140 binder. Based on your videos, I got a single side laminator setup, formerly I was using spray fixatif on the covers. I have a used Triumph 4810 cutter which is a TANK and will never die.

The result is I can produce gloss laminate good quality perfect bound books for less than $5000 total outlay. That's usually a $10k and up capability.

The thing I learned: be ware of refurbishers. There are a lot of crooks running around nowadays, who find junked machines, send them to you and then fight against returns or refunds. I learned this the hard way.

[garysanders]

Deciding between the top companies, and which is the best option, is not just price. There is service. And when you own a production machine, service availability and the quality of the service staff is actually more important than the price of the equipment. We have leased Ricoh machines exclusively in our location since 2008 due to Konica service issues in the past, when we had those. And have never looked back. Ricohs service techs are very-very good and why most of their techs have been with the company for many years.

[barneyjmusic]

This was truly outstanding. There is a wealth of information that you gave out, which I struggled to find in other videos. And you are right, looking at the comments was very helpful too, I am so grateful to see that other people like to share knowledge!

[chorleyprint]

We started out by reselling print and it’s a great way to start. The issue we found though was that local customers expect printing done quicker than trade printers could offer so we ended up buying a Konica copier. Ran that for about 6 months and then bought a Xerox C560 which was awful in the end. Quality was good but the placement on the page was shocking.

We’ve now got a Konica C3070 and absolutely love it. Prints everything we throw at it with ease. Definitely a Konica fan now.

[ACIDICcitric]

I work at KM and I appreciate your videos - it’s cool seeing how KM equipment is used and helps print shops like yours!

[hadzisnezanagriva]

I love watching you. And period. The topics you talk about are great for us. Please continue with good work

[CaleSchibler]

I've been watching your videos nonstop for the last few days. I've stumbled across your channel because I want to move up. Printing music is a very niche market, and when done right is so rewarding. Started with an old HP that could do 12x18 colour. Moved to an OCE and now a Bizhub C652. Now that my newest machine died, I'm looking at a used press, the C7000 with the SD-506! I had to outsource a job to another printer that had an AccurioPress, and I love the quality! I'm Konica for life! Wish I could afford such a beautiful new machine! Thank you for all your videos, I"m learning so much!

[johnweaver]

When I had my Bindery there was also an opportunity to put ink on paper.... We had a huge electronics company tank and they had IBM infoprint 1567's everywhere you turn. Those days are gone however the value was the fire sale on the final weekend and I bought the comsumables out of the stockroom for a price that people would not believe had they not been there. My point is look at the angle of who is going down the tubes and how can you act on it. With my investment it literally made a profit the first time I plugged in the machines.... Nice work once again Dan....

[bbiancini]

This video is 2+ years old and still super valuable

[Daniel-gsxu]

What machine would you recommend for a beginner? I know there are lots of machines, but I'd like a small one i can use in my house/ garage

[edoakes]

I’m in the UK and bought my first production machine in 2007, a Xerox DC260, great little machine, continued with Xerox over the years with Xerox 700, J75 and now have 2 V180’s. We had a Ricoh C7100 for 6 years up to last week when we made our first purchase with KM, the new C14000 which is a beast of a machine, so far very impressed 👍🏻

[MrEklips]

When i started working in print shop 3 years ago, we had Develop C1060 & Konica Minolta C1085.
Now i operate on two C1085, two C3070 and C1070.

[nate_riggins_photography]

Moving my shop over to KM printers from Xerox was the best decision I’ve ever made. Better uptime, better service, lower lease cost and lower click rate cost.

[rle]

I am a small offset print shop and I am looking to get into digital printing. I know it’s a loaded question but what can one expect to pay for a lease on a machine with a service contract. Let’s say I do between 25, 000 - 50, 000 clicks a month. Mostly I will be doing black and white. I print mainly ncr and 110lb index. On the index I would like to be able to do 2 sided printing at once(duplex). What would you recommend as for a machine if I buy something used. Thank you

[darisnelalbertogomezmendoz]

Do you recommend accurioprint? Cost benefit?

[bobbyrobins]

If u were an indie author and wanted to print your own books instead of using offset or POD, but actually start your own publishing company that essentially prints your own books…but also try and keep it as lean as possible, what equipment would you need and recommend?

Let’s say the goal was printing 5000 books off the hop but wanting it scalable to be able to print hundreds of thousands to millions…basically I’m wondering what it would look like to print and ship my own books for an upcoming release…what would I need?? And could I get the job done in a small office or room…
-printer
-paper cutter
-binding machine
-laminator
-anything else I’d need and would love to hear your recommendations! Thanks bobby

[joezdihar]

Approximately 14 years ago, I had the opportunity to work with a Fuji Xerox machine for 2-3 years. Following my departure from that position, I pursued a career as a freelance designer. Now, I find myself contemplating a return to the digital printing industry as an entrepreneur. Recently, I've been enticed by testimonials from acquaintances who enthusiastically endorse the Toshiba brand. Do you think opting for Toshiba e-studio printers is a wise decision?

[printhubbrasil]

About the Office version of the Konicas, here in Brasil we use this machines A LOT, i know people that runs literally millions of copies on "Office" Konicas, i think today the best laser printer to start a business here its a konica like that, a C224, C364 etc and the konicas final 8, here in Brasil its very very difficult to buy a konica 3070, is REALLY expesive so you need to have a reaaaaly big print shop to justify buying one of those. Today i have in my print shop a Konica C364, a Ricoh 2051, both color machines, konica to run thick paper and ricoh to run text / color books, a Xerox 5890 (90ppm mono) and a Samsung 4070 for mono cheap mono printing. I hope you can understand my english, i learned pretty much watching youtube videos hahahah