14 Ways to Be Greener, More Productive and Cost Efficient With Your Printer
I was reading a blog post today on Stepcase Lifehack and which provided “7 Ways to Be Greener and More Productive with your Printer” which included a list of:
- Keep supplies at the point of use
- Print in “draft” mode to save ink
- Keep a scratch paper tray
- Make your printed documents come out in the proper order
- User scratch paper by default and print on new paper only when necessary
- Label your printer’s particularities
- Just don’t print
I would add seven additional hints and trick that I find particularly useful:
8. Set your printer to default to multiple pages per side. Many printers will allow you to print to or more pages per side, I default my print driver to 2 pages per side to use half as much paper and only change it to one page per side when absolutely necessary.
9. Invest in a printer capable of duplexing and use it. I extend my saving further for most printed output by printing in duplex which allows me to net four pages per piece of paper when used in conjunction with printing two pages per side.
10. Use a laser printer. The cost per page is significantly less on a per page basis when printing on a laser printer than an inkjet, not to mention they are generally faster.
11. Choose a multifunction device. There are multifunction printer, copier, fax, and scan devices that meet the will meet the needs for users from one to a large department; choose a multifunction device to eliminate the waste created by investing in multiple devices that serve a single purpose.
12. Pause your print queue. If you are working with a shared printer and will be printing multiple documents, pause your print queue until you are ready to retrieve the documents from the printer to ensure that they are grouped together and other jobs don’t slip between yours.
13. Take your print off the printer. It never ceases to amaze me how many print jobs go unclaimed with a shared printer. Even in my small work group with about ten people sharing one printer there is almost always a piece of paper just sitting on the printer. If you don’t need it, don’t print it; if you need the hard copy pick it up!
14. Just don’t print. In a different vein than Lifehack suggest often we are printing documents for the benefit of others, like hand outs at a meeting. Save yourself the hassle and use a projector during meetings to avoid the extraneous print-outs that are generated. If somebody wants a copy following the meeting you can always e-mail it later.
Enjoy the savings and efficiency you will gain from improving your printer use!
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