I was shocked when I bought a printer and found out the cable was not included, but then the next one I bought was the same way. Then I received a microphone that had no cable included with it.
What is the thought process companies have on this new trend of screwing the customer out of an essential part of the product? I would think the extreme malcontent created in your customer base outweighs the benefit of saving a couple bucks.
I’ve been selling printers for 15 years, and there’s never been a parallel or USB cable included with any new HP, Epson or Panasonic printer I’ve ever seen. Even the once-popular Okidata dot-matrix invoice printers didn’t come with 'em.
I’ve never seen one without a power cable though.
If you go to the big box stores, you’ll see USB cables for $29.99 and up. I sell 'em for $9.99 and still make about $9.00 each on them.
Whereas I have never bought one that didn’t have the USB cable. I have at present 2 HP printers in use, both purchased at Staples in the last 2 years and both had the USB cables in the box as part of the package. The old Epson and HP printers in the cupboard had them, too. Likewise my present and my old scanner, both HP. Both scanners were purchased at Costco.
Yet last night my friend bought a new printer/scanner and there was no cable. He bought it at The Real Canadian Superstore. Which I thought was just typical of that cheezy outfit.
Stock up on a bunch of cables from a place like monoprice.com; there’s no excuse to pay retail prices on something like that. This way, the next time you buy a USB device without a cable, you’re out a buck. Big deal.
Buying a super expensive USB cable doesn’t get you much…
I am not a printer manufacturer, so all I can give you is guesses, but I’d guess it’s because of one or more of the following reasons:
Some printers can be connected to the computer in more than one way, using more than one kind of cable (to a USB port or parallel port, for example). It would be a waste to include a type of cable that wouldn’t be used.
If the cable is a fairly standard one, some of the people buying the printer will already have a cable they can use (perhaps from a previous printer that they’re replacing), so they don’t need another one.
Because they can. If they can get away with not including cables, because they’re readily available separately, why not do so and save a little money (from their point of view)?
In a way this is a good thing. If I am buying a (e.g.) printer to replace an old one, I already have the cable that I was using for the old printer. I can continue to use the old cable with the new printer; if the cable was included, that would add to the cost of the printer and I would have an extra cable that I couldn’t use.
When I bought a printer the manual said something to the effect of “Depending on the country, cables may not be included.” I guess some places force the manufacturers to supply it.
I personally could do without all the cables; I probably have 15 IDE cables alone from various purchases. It is annoying when you have to make a second trip or something to purchase it. Websites like newegg usually have pictures of all the accessories included so you can make a judgment on what you need to buy beforehand.
Wow. I have opposite problem. I can’t for the life of me figure out why I have so many bloody USB cables. I know for a fact that I’ve never bought one in my life. I’m certain they didn’t come with my current, 8-year-old printer (for which I bought a parallel cable to work with JetDirect). Maybe all of the various external hard drive cases account for some of them. Maybe the scanners included USB?
I have never seen a printer that came with a cable. You always have had to buy it separately.
It probably started at a time before cables were standardized (did you need 3 feet? Six feet? Longer?), and continues for a variety of reasons including the fact that many people replace printers and use their existing cables. It’s not like it’s making any money for the printer manufacturer selling the cables (the don’t make them) and it makes it easier for them than to have to order them and include them with every printer.
It’s just another way to screw the customer out of an essential accessory he has to have, so he has to buy it separately-- like the way condoms don’t automatically come with a packet of chocolate syrup.
All HP printers sold in Australia & New Zealand come with a USB cable- I know this because I sell them at work and they’re the only brand we don’t have to add-on USB cable sales for. Canon, Brother, Samsung and even Lexmark (IIRC, I haven’t sold a Lexmark printer in ages) printers are all sold sans USB cable.
The reasoning behind this- officially- is, I’m told, because the manufacturers feel that anyone buying one of their products already has the USB cable from a previous printer, and if they don’t, a USB cable is all of $10 (or free if you’re nice to the sales people) and therefore not a big deal to the consumer, but it’s one more part they’ve got to include with every. single. printer. that they sell, which impacts the bottom line somewhere.
The real reason is money, as been mentioned previously- cables have a high mark-up on them, and printers have bugger all. In fact, for many new printers, the replacement cartridges actually cost more than the printer itself. The idea, of course, is that the companies make their money from the cartridges, but what generally happens is people get their empty cartridges refilled for a fraction of the cost of buying new ones, so I really don’t understand how the whole thing remains a viable business model, to be honest…
In the range our store stocks, the HP printers usually come with “demo” cartridges that are only partially filled, while the sans-cable Canon printers come with full capacity cartridges. Generally people would prefer to buy a $20 USB cable (or reuse an old one) than fork out $95 for a set of cartridges.
IIRC, some of the Epsons come with both USB and full cartridges, but they aren’t a big part of our range.
Except that you probably can’t, thanks to hardware manufacturers’ endearing habit of producing about eight different types of socket for the “peripheral” end of the USB lead.
I have leads with standard USB plugs (i.e. same plug at both ends), plus a whole snake pit of other cables with square plugs (printer 1), rectangular plugs (printer 2), miniature trapezium-shaped plugs (digital camera), slightly less miniature trapezium-shaped plugs (MP3 player) and so on. WHY???
I have the same problem with RCA component cables. I don’t know where they keep coming from.
My printer’s have always come with parallel cables though.
The last printer I got came free with my laptop, so I didn’t mind it not coming with a cable. That and I had some also. The Canon printers I’ve had come with full ink cartridges - the fax machine I got (free after rebate) had a tiny little ribbon.
Yes, we’ve gotten to the point where the cables and ink cost more to us than the printer.
Just noticed your location. Maybe it’s different up in Canada, eh? I just checked the two HP inkjet printers I have in stock and neither comes with the cable.
FWIW, when someone buys a printer from me, I usually throw in the 99 cent USB cable for free. People invariably forget or don’t know that they have to buy the cable separately.