We’re printing less than we used to. The printer used to be essential at home and in the office, but things are changing. Advances in digitization and changes in work dynamics are two of many factors causing people to rely less on these cartridge-powered machines.
HP is experiencing this shift first-hand. At Bernstein’s recent 40th Annual Strategic Decisions Conference, CEO Enrique Lores acknowledged that the printing industry is facing a challenge. He also mentioned that page printing has decreased since the pandemic, at least according to the company’s own calculations.
Page Printing Has Been Reduced by One-Fifth
It’s no secret that the emergence of covid-19 transformed the way we work. During lockdowns, many of people worked from home, and companies had to update their processes. The days of taking a paper report to your boss’s office were gone. Although time has passed, the print industry hasn’t recovered to pre-pandemic levels.
“On the office space, clearly, the amount of pages that is being printed is lower than before the pandemic,” Lores said at the event. He added that this is also due to the fact that fewer people are now working face-to-face in offices. Although households have had a slightly different dynamic, their situation isn’t much better than businesses.
During the pandemic, HP customers printed more from home. However, since then, the number of pages printed has been declining. Not everything in the printer market is showing negative numbers. In fact, the industrial sector is growing. This growth is primarily driven by the need for labels printed for packaging, possibly due to the rise in e-commerce.
The leading U.S. company in the printer market projected that the number of pages printed would decrease by around 20% after the pandemic, and its estimates turned out to be accurate. “This is more or less where we are,” Lores said. HP also noted that this reduction may impact the number of printers sold.
Image | Mahrous Houses | Evelyn Geissler
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