QFT, especially here in Arizona which is why I bought a color laser printer. The toner carts are $120 each the last time I bought them but I’ve had to replace them only once (all four) in eight years. Still cheaper than inkjet carts.
QED
Pining for the days when you could go into Costco and get photo files printed easily and reasonably priced.
I know you didn’t mention Epson, but perhaps I can describe my experience. In my smallish condo, I needed a printer/scanner/copier. I also wanted to get out of the cheap printer/expensive cartridge game. So this Epson comes with ink reservoirs and you buy the ink in bottles and refill the reservoirs. I have bought only Epson ink so far, but it is not that expensive. If they made it too dear, competition would appear since they have no control over what you put in the reservoirs. I don’t print that much and sometimes the print heads clog but there is a cleaning cycle and they clear.
Now the downsides. It jams too often for my liking. After I clear the jam, it insists it is still jammed. So I pull the plug (there is no on/off switch) and plug it back in. But the absolutely worst part of this printer is that the control panel is tiny and almost impossible to read. I bring in a magnifying glass if I have to use the control panel. And the push buttons are labeled with icons that have no obvious meaning. Aside from that it mostly works well. I probably use it mainly for scanning while my wife uses it for printing, each from own computer. I seem to recall that it was a little tricky connecting it to the Wi-Fi since I had to enter the network password (15 characters long) on the “keyboard” displayed on that impossibly small display.
At least they give you a 51% Costco member discount to Shutterfly now. Not as convenient as having a photo printer in the same town, of course, but it’s better than nothing (if you can wait for them to arrive by mail).
We don’t really buy prints anymore, but we do use that to make annual family calendars or the occasional picture book or jigsaw puzzle. One upside is that Shutterfly prints and products are generally (much) higher quality than what you’d get at the local photo printer or kiosk, and you have much more variety in product selection.
On the other hand, i haven’t wanted to print a photo in ages. I put nice ones that I’ll want to look at again in a folder on my phone. If a want to share, I upload them on Google docs or Dropbox and share a link. Or just email it text photos. Or hand someone my phone, open to the photo viewing app that sees my nice organized folders.
Color my as another one mystified at anyone wanting to print a photo.
I could certainly imagine embedding a picture in a flyer, like advertising the office XMas party then wanting to print off a bunch of those flyers to hang in breakrooms, etc.
If you don’t mind looking around for a while on places like Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace, you may be able to find a high quality color laser printer pretty cheaply. I’ve had luck that way. Sometimes businesses or individuals are looking to get rid of their bulky printer that they don’t use anymore. If you’re really lucky it will have toner, but chances are it will be out or low and you’ll have to buy new toner. But otherwise, the printer may be in great shape and last for years.
I got my last black and white Brother laser that way, $20 and it lasted a good couple years with the included toner.
I don’t know. I love to buy many types of things second hand. But there would have to be an extreme discount (like the printer and some toner for $20 that Reply mentioned) for me to do that. Plus, my aprtment is on the third floor. Between my general lack of coorination and the weight of some of these printers, it would not be safe for me to carry it up the stairs. I will think about it though.
Re Photographs
I definitely want to make some photos into computer files. I don’t see myself printing any images that need glossy paper or photo quality.
I’m not mystified. It’s just not something i do much any more. Although … I have a photo i want to print to apply to plywood and cut into a jigsaw puzzle. But I’ll pay someone to do that with now expensive equipment than i want to own.
I had an HP inkjet that failed miserably. kept telling me ink carts were “unauthorized” even though they were HP carts. Basically it bricked the printer. After extensive research I found out this was a known issue (for 3 freaking years). I eventually got HP to admit it was their issue and they gave me full purchase price credit, I got a decent 19 inch HP monitor.
OK, so now I had no printer…I needed one. I got a Brother MFCJ805 inkjet. It has large carts that last forever and it runs head maintenance on its own. It prints very nice photos and prints text amazingly fast.
TLDNR…Short version… I concur with the others in the thread favoring Brother printers.
WHOA! Bravo to you! 
I have an Epson color inkjet printer. I would like to take it out in the street and drive over it with my car. On the upside, I can use off-brand reconditioned cartridges with it. I do so little printing anymore that this has worked okay.
I have one of these, also. It’s my second one in about ten years, which isn’t bad for a printer. I like the large tanks and the bottled ink. They’ve improved the refill operation significantly, so there is no accidental spillage like before. The only problem is that we do almost zero color printing, so there is a possibility of the jets clogging from disuse. There is a “super-clean” process to fix that, though. We tend to reuse paper that only has printed matter on one side, so care has to be taken not to use paper that has wrinkles or folds or tears, as it can cause jams.