Curiously, the kickoff event featured two outside “entrepreneurs” as spokespeople: Ivanka Trump (whose main qualification is her dad, for whose business she works) and Bill Rancic (unknown to me, but apparently once a winner on the Apprentice reality show hosted by Ivanka’s dad). And their expertise on the subject of cost-cutting on printing is…?

The point here is that an HP laser MFP more than pays for itself in consumables, paper and energy savings. But compared to what? Well, the obvious conclusion is that it’s cheaper to print (and copy and fax) on a laser machine than it is to do so on an ink jet machine — including much of HP’s own product line. You also get additional savings through improved energy management (a real plus in current HP models) and duplex printing, which saves on paper costs — but that’s commonly available even on cheap ink jet MFPs.

The $2,500 figure: Where did that come from? Even if we assume that the difference between printing on a cheap ink jet is four times as much as on a high-end Laser MFP (really stretching it, in our opinion) and that you print nothing but color pages (at around 5 cents on HP’s lowest-cost-per-page laser MFP versus up to 20 cents on a few cheap ink jets), we are talking about over 15,000 color pages a year on a single machine to approach the $2,500 mark in savings.

Is anyone idiotic enough to print that many pages on low-cost ink jet MFPs, which normally have duty cycles of under 1,000 pages a month? Are we to believe that these $79 – $129 devices are working night and day cranking out marketing materials, with harried users endlessly swapping ink cartridges, which often have a capacity of under 1,000 pages apiece?

While we think that HP’s color laser MFPs are very good (especially the higher-end ones) and certainly preferable to ink jets for serious business work, we don’t understand what this campaign is about. Are there really major businesses so lame-brained as to be unaware of the cost advantages of just about any laser printer or MFP over its ink jet equivalent? Isn’t HP admitting also that its ink jet division is charging too much for ink cartridges? And while HP LaserJet MFPs offer better operating costs that ink jets, do they want potential buyers to start noticing that there are competitors that offer even better costs per page than HP in the laser area?

The campaign, which will be supported by point-of-sale literature and through gripping ROI stories on social media, will soon spread worldwide.

Our advice: Kill the few ink jets still remaining in your office, look closely at costs per page of all machines whether made by HP or others and replace where you can have an advantage. Finally, make an effort to print fewer pages — and print in color only when really needed. After all, most printers and MFPs print many pages that never get read.

At 31ppm, it was a major speed upgrade from the once popular but discontinued 22ppm Color LaserJet 4650 family, though it otherwise has similar features and prices. The 4700n, which is now the network-ready base model, has a street price of $1,349. A networked version with duplexing, the 4700dn, goes for $1,599. The 4700dtn adds two extra standard paper trays and goes for $2,499.

The Color LaserJet 4700n and 4700dn come standard with a 100-sheet multipurpose tray and a 500-sheet paper tray capacity. The 4700dtn comes with three 500-sheet trays standard, for a standard capacity of 1,600 sheets. Optional inputs in increments of 500 sheets can be added to all models to increase the total paper supply to 2,600 sheets.

Output capacity is 500 sheets, which is better than some, but still low for heavy-duty workgroup use. Optional single-position stapling of up to 30 sheets at a time adds 750 sheets of output capacity for $699. That is suitable for simple office work.

These models also have job retention features. These include proof and hold (which allows you to send a job to the printer, print only the first copy for proofing, and then either release the job from the printer control panel or delete it if you find mistakes in the proof) and private (or secure) printing (which allows you to send a confidential job to the printer and hold it for release at the control panel to avoid it being seen by prying eyes). HP has been gradually introducing these features to all its laser printers, after first introducing them on its upscale monochrome models. (To activate these features, you need the hard drive.)

There are a variety of features that enhance the 4700 family’s attractiveness. The printers

The consumables costs for the Color LaserJet 4700 models, at around 10.3¢ in color and about 1.8¢ in black-and-white, are pretty much in line with industry averages. The high-capacity cartridges, though very convenient in the long run, will require large initial cash outlay once the starter cartridges run out. The color cartridges have a street cost of about $283 each, and the high-capacity black costs $199!

For a fuller review and for information on other similar products, see the Better Buys for Business Color Laser Printer Guide.