Epson revamps printer and ink approach

San Francisco

TICKING off one's best customers every few months isn't a flawless corporate strategy. It tends to incite strong feelings, at best, and massive class-action lawsuits, at worst. Epson seems to have finally realised as much. After decades of selling cheap printers that require a steady stream of expensive ink cartridges, the company is smashing its business model to bits. In September, the Tokyo-based tech giant will offer a new line of consumer printers in the United States, each with enough ink to print at least 4,000 documents. When the well finally runs dry, customers will be able to refill it with a bottle, just like a baby.

The machines even have a trendy name: EcoTank. "It's a really big advantage to the end user," says John Lang, Epson's CEO for North America. "That anxiety and that fear of running out of ink - it's amazing to me that that was so prevalent," he added. "Anxiety" is a diplomatic way to put it; a lot of Epson owners (including myself) would describe the feeling more colourfully. At the moment, Epson's home and small-business models come with enough ink to rip off only 220 or so documents. What's more, they don't work well with third-party cartridges, and the whole range of colours needs replacing when one runs d…