How To Make Printing in Your Office More Eco-Friendly

When you are choosing printers for your company try to be as consistent as possible. If you have a range of printers some black and white, some color, some toner, some inkjet and a range of different brands and models then you're not only making your life more difficult in term of maintenance and support, you are also unable to re-use parts. The green thing to do is buy a number of the same make and model that way if one becomes damaged beyond repair, you can keep the parts as spares for the other machines and recycle the other components. This also has the benefit of reducing your need for technical support.

There are a number of ways in which you can get the most out of your printer cartridges:

· Refilling: Cartridge refills are available form computer hardware store and online. This is much more economical than replacing them. It is important to ensure that you have the correct product to match your empty cartridge. Manufacturers and retail outlets will help you find the right one. If you don’t feel confident re-filling your cartridge yourself you can have the service provided by a professional company. Though this is more expensive, you may find it more convenient. Most cartridges can be re-filled for a maximum of three times, then they will need to be replaced.

· Recycling: Many of the companies who have collection service for re-filling also offer a collection service for recycling. They will guarantee that the used cartridge will not end up in a landfill.

One way you can help save the environment and show your clients your commitment to eco-friendly business practices is to print on 100% recycled paper. You don’t have to stop at putting it into your printers either.

GreenPrint World is a software package suitable for business home use. It removes those wasteful pages that crop up bearing only an advertising banner, URL, or run-over columns before you print- problems virtually every computer user encounters. You can also avoid including unwanted images and easily and economically print PDF files. What’s more, it’s free.

If you outsource your printing it's not hard these days to find printing companies who will print your business brochures, letterheads and business cards on recycled paper stock. Some of them all so use environmentally friendly soy ink. Here are just a few of them:

· GreenPrinter

· Moo

· Jamie Wieck