All Leaders

  • 1.  YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-22-2025 11:52 PM
    I would appreciate your input on what your Church does for a copy machine…
    Do you own or lease it?
    If you own, do you have a maint. company? If yes, do you have a contract with them or do you call as needed?
    If you lease, I would love to know if you’re in the same situation as we are (below) it’s gotten very expensive.

    Our copier lease started 4 years ago it’s coming up for renewal within the year. The cost of the copier new (back then) was $6,000, but us leasing this copier over the five year period will cost us over $28,000. We’re a small Church, we print an average of 6K copies per month.
    Prior to this contract we were only paying $3K a year, so it’s almost doubled in 5 years.

    As the treasurer, I am mortified at this price hike. So I wanted to hear what you’ve experienced…
    Thank you in advance for your input.

    Lynette George
    Treasurer, Evergreen Lutheran Church and Preschool
    (360)440-6497


  • 2.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-24-2025 07:55 AM

    We just purchased a new copier.  Very small church.  Paid about 7k.   Much better than lease option.  Our prior machine lasted 10 years, so even longer than most lease terms.   If you haven't, check out the Sharp model BP-70C31

    https://business.sharpusa.com/Document-Systems/Models/Details/BP-70C31



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    Troy HILDEBRANDT
    Christ the Life Lutheran
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    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-25-2025 07:48 AM
    Regarding copiers. I was in that industry early in my sales career.   I can tell you this, most business customers leased the equipment for tax and cash flow purposes.   Most churches purchased outright and were given certain discounts for cash as time of sale, and nonprofit status.

    I guess this is fair to say, as the salesman i much preferred when some leased! I made a little more money and I knew I'd place another machine in 36 months. 




    Original Message


  • 4.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-27-2025 11:09 AM

    At Christ the Redeemer we have a purchased machine (8 yo) and a new lease machine.  Both are in good working order and we use them both.  We were told by our service company that the copier manufacturers stop making spare parts at the 8 to 10 year range.  So eventually we will have to scrap the machine we own because we can't repair it.  Rick F 



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    Richard Fisk
    Office Asst / Business Mgr
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    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-27-2025 11:58 AM

    We are a smaller church (under 300 members).  I understand the argument about purchasing versus leasing, but we have had a great experience with leasing.  

    I'm not sure how much location plays into pricing and/or availability, but we are located in southern Illinois.  We lease a machine that prints black and white, and color.  The lease includes all toner and maintenance.  They monitor the toner remotely and send it when it get's low.  They've been great about quick service on the few times we had issues - mainly issues with getting a new computer set up with it.  Our copier is a Kyocera CS 2554 Fax Booklet Finisher.  The lease includes 5500 black and white copies per month with overages at $0.008 per copy and color copies are priced on a scale based on the amount of color that is required on the page as follows:  Tier 1 $0.0275, Tier 2 $0.0395 and Tier III $0.0525.  This system of pricing has significantly reduced our printing costs. Our total lease cost for 2024 was right at $3000.  

    I've read in other posts that people are interested in folding options... I highly encourage this!  We elected for this printer for many reasons, but two of the main reasons were the folding AND stapling options.  This has saved countless hours of manual folding and stapling and is worth every penny!  We all know there are not enough hours in the day... and these options have really been a time saver.  The printer isn't really fast, but I can print our 150 bulletins in mixed color (usually 4 legal sheets per bulletin).  The machine prints, folds and staples in about 2 hours give or take.  But the best part is that I can be working on other things while this is done!  I also have the machine set with favorite styles so I can print the bulletins by pushing three buttons, and then print and staple our large print bulletins using a preset style (format).  Easy and quick!



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    Cheryl Schnicker
    St. James Lutheran Church
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    Original Message


  • 6.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-24-2025 08:52 AM

    I don't think leasing equipment is good for churches or other non-profits. Besides paying way more than the purchase price through the course of the lease, you also have to reimburse the leasing company for property tax (at least in Maryland).

    We purchased 3 copiers for our church, day school, and early childhood center a couple of years ago. We pay the company for each copy that is made. In return, they send us supplies (toner, drums, etc.) at no additional cost. They also send technicians when we need service.

    Knowing that we will need to replace the copiers one day, we are taking a certain amount of funds from our operating budget and setting them aside for the future. We hope that we can develop a rotation schedule for the copiers so that we don't have to replace more than one in any particular fiscal year.

    Blessings,

    Steve



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    Steve Haar
    St. Paul Lutheran Church and School
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    Original Message


  • 7.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-24-2025 10:52 AM
    My experience is that you also need to look at the cost for toner/supplies. Many years back I bought a large HP printer/copier because it was the cheapest among the machines I looked at but the cost of the toner made the machine very expensive to operate. Now we lease two machines with a contract that includes an allowance for a certain number of copies. All maintenance and toner is included in the price. If we go over the allotted number of copies, we pay for the overage.  So long story short you need to look at the cost for toner, too. And perhaps check with different companies as prices may vary.

    Good luck!

    Ginny Ranisate, Office Manager
    St. Johns Lutheran Church
    803 W First St
    Park Rapids, MN 56470
    218-732-9783



    Original Message


  • 8.  RE: YOUR COPIER…to lease or not to lease?

    Posted 01-24-2025 12:22 PM

    We are also a small church and we lease our copier (it serves as our main printer as well).  We pay $554/month but that includes service and toner refills.  We like that the company is very quick to respond when we have a problem and usually sends someone out the same day.  Also, they monitor our toner levels and automatically send replacements as we are nearing the need for a new one.  We are about 2 years into a 5 year lease, which at the end of the lease, I anticipate they will just upsell us to lease a newer model like they did with this one.  There is the ability to add components to this copier, like a folding mechanism to automatically fold our bulletins for each service, but that was a little outside our price range for now.  But it's nice to know it could be an option if our separate folding machine dies!

    Happy to answer any further questions!

    Jennifer



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    Jennifer Smith
    St. John's Lutheran Church
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    Original Message


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