KC Inks

Can't wait any longer!!!

2011-08-04T02:24:00.000-07:00

The front of the line up!

First sight of the ginger car in with the posh cars! All the cars were either black, whire or silver (apart from three other cars - red Ferrari, yellow Ferrari and green Chevy) we stood out like a sore thumb in our 70's ginger!

Craig and Jim the photographers about to be squashed by Richard and Jamie in the Bentley!

Perfectly framed by to beautiful cars! From the front of the line up it was Lambourgini, Aston Martin (carbon wrapped), Aston Martin, Jaguar, Dodge Viper, GRANADA, Porsche!!!!

Cannonball Run Europe 2011

2011-08-04T02:06:00.000-07:00

So the big day finally arrived and we were heading to a very posh hotel in Surrey to meet everyone and get ready for the off! The excitement was unbelievable - people had come from America and Norway to take part, all the cars were lined up ready for photos!

Everyone had time to wonder around, take pictures and admire the beautiful cars before lunch. We had a lovely barbeque on the terrace, I don't think anyone believed us that it was the first time this year John and I had sat outside without coats on!

The line up of cars was fabulous! We were the only "old" car there and we certainly got a lot of attention. As we lined up someone commented "that's a PROPER Cannonball car" John was chuffed to bits! We were feeling much more confident with the car as we had a very good run down from Cumbria with no problems.

We were setting off on the same day as the Silverstone Grand Prix, luckily for all the Formula 1 fans we had time to watch it before the Drivers Briefing at 2.30pm. It was definately getting difficult to sit still after a while - knowing we were going to be driving all night and just not being able to wait to find out where we were going!!!!

Watching the F1, I don't think anyone could sit still! We were on tenterhooks and we weren't going to find out until we were in the car which ferry port we were going to!!!!

Day One of our big adventure.

2011-07-27T01:13:00.000-07:00

Our first day was at Twickenham for the Middlesex 7s! It really is a good day out and it is great fun to watch 7's rugby - it is a lot faster than "normal" rugby! The 7's match day is always geared towards raising money for charity, three this year Wooden Spoon (a childrens charity that helps young people who are challenged either physically, mentally or socially), Help For Heroes (supporting our Armed Forces) and of course the RFU Injured Players Foundation who support people who have had a catastrophic injury through rugby - as you all know John is an injured player so a member of the club!!!

A rare picture of us both together! All ready to go and have fun! The IPF always have a hospitality area at the 7's and they were very excited to see us in the ginger car!

We were there good and early, the stadium is never full apart from "big" match days so there is always an atmosphere of a party - everyone always dresses up for some reason - we saw monks, where's wally (about 20 of them all dressed identically!) a group of santa's, men in togas, cowboys, and even Elvis! It's always a shock to see big burly men in little pink tutus!!!

We had a lovely lunch and got to meet up with people that you only ever email or talk to on the phone, so it really was great! There are some other injured players who you only ever see at Twickenham because we are all from different parts of the country and only ever meet up on match days!

We watched some awesome rugby, we were supporting Esher who got all the way to the final only to be beated 12-19 by Samurai. Pictured above are Brazil and Durham University, Brazil won that match! Afterwards we took the banners off the car and were waved off, ready to prepare for the excitement the following day - and boy was it exciting!!!!!

Cruising on Windermere

2011-07-26T05:38:00.001-07:00

I know I am supposed to be telling you all about the Cannonball Run but this is something that John and I were invited to last Thursday and it is to do with fund raising so I thought I would tell you about it! We advertise on the Bay Radio, they have really gone out of their way to help us with publicity for the Cannonball Run, even to the extent of doing phone interviews every day with updates of how we were getting on and really pushing the charity side of things. We of course are incredibly grateful and had great fun going to the studio in Lancaster for our preliminary interview. Silly me I completely forgot to take any pictures!

Every year The Bay organise a cruise on Windermere for all the businesses who are associated with them. So last Thursday evening we went to Lakeside (the south end of the lake) to board the steamer!

It was a cloudy evening with a few spots of rain, a typical Cumbrian summer day in other words!

The Mallard - the little car ferry that runs from Bowness-On-Windermere to the Sawry side of the lake so you don't have to spend hours driving round. The ferry is on chains connected to each side that pull it backwards and forwards, the only problem is if there is too much water in the lake (if it rains to much!) the ferry can't run!!!

Catching the last of the sunshine looking towards Great Langdale, very beautiful!

Going back past Bowness looking back towards the north end of the lake. We had a lovely time despite not being the life and soul of the party! John and I were still struggling from a lack of sleep and the gentle rocking of the boat really made it difficult to keep our eyes open! At one point we were propping each other up hoping no one noticed our lack of conversation! Not to worry we are nearly back to normal now - it was worth it!!!

We're back!

2011-07-21T02:12:00.001-07:00

We have made it! What an amazing week we have had, you will have to forgive me, I know I promised to keep you updated but it was the most full on experience of our lives! I have masses of photos and stories to tell but I really need to catch up on some sleep first! So watch this space over the next few days and get ready to see the most amazing cars (and people!)

Unofficial start!

2011-07-08T02:30:00.001-07:00

The ginger car has come to work! We are all packed and ready and have come to work until lunch time, then setting off to Lancaster to be interviewed on the local radio station The Bay! The car has been having lots of admiring looks from the general public! I have just finished doing a few last minute jobs like having a spare set of keys cut - we only had one set and have spent the last year worrying about shutting them in the boot by mistake! John and I are a mixture of excitement and fear at the moment, the car is running beautifully apart from one small problem - starting! The automatic choke is not working as it should (even though it has been to the garage a LOT in the last few months) once you are going it is fine, it just takes a few minutes to think about it! Hopefully she will behave herself on holiday! Well all that remains is to wish us luck and keep your fingers firmly crossed for us! I will be putting up lots of pictures and videos over the coming weeks so look out for us!

We have a winner!

2011-07-01T07:36:00.001-07:00

We have a winner! M Philips from Bristol is the lucky winner, we will be posting your prize today! Congratulations!

Last chance to enter.

2011-07-01T02:56:00.001-07:00

Don't forget this is your last chance to enter our competition to win an IPAD2! All you have to do to enter is type "IPAD PLEASE" into the promo box when placing your order, it's as simple as that! We will be picking the winner (at random) tomorrow 1st July 2011 and announcing the winner via the usual channels - Twitter, Facebook, here on the blog and on our website. Good luck!

Preparations in full swing!

2011-06-30T06:08:00.000-07:00

It feels like we have been preparing for a long time now but really we have just begun. The long haul of getting the ginger car in a fit state to get to the motorway (let alone all the way around Europe) is finally nearing completion. We have now started doing the fun stuff and stocking up for the trip!

The check list is impressive;

Passports

Driving Licenses - we are still waiting for John's new photo one - but not panicking yet...

Insurance documents

Car log book

MOT certificate - got a nice new one!

Medical insurance card

Breakdown cover

Roadmaps of Europe

Sat Nav

Headlight adapters

Warning triangle

Fluorescent jacket

Spare bulb kit

First Aid kit

Fire Extinguisher

Tool kit

Crash Helmet for track day

Red Bull and Buzz Gum!!!

There is also an "if you have space"

Tyre weld or mini spare

Spanner/socket set

pliers

cable ties

gaffer tape

water

petrol can (with petrol in it!)

spare fuses

wheel brace and jack

hose clips

cooland hose repair kit

coil of stout wire (to tie your exhaust on with when it falls off!)

We are taking EVERYTHING on both lists as well as some extras - oh the joy of an enormous boot!

Haynes manual - bible for how to mend car!

tow rope

extra oil (special stuff for our old girl)

pillow - for sleepy heads in the middle of night drive

spare parts - hoses, spark plugs, etc

mobile phone - for when we break down in the middle of the night/on top of a mountain!

laptop - to keep you up to date

Sports mix sweeties

A big bag of GOOD LUCK

Fame at last!

2011-06-30T01:58:00.000-07:00

John is famous! We have had a few mentions in various magazines, yesterday we received this months copy of Touchline magazine (it's the rugby magazine from Twickenham!) It's a really nice write up, John is very excited about it!

You may recognize the picture, it is the one we used on our website here. The picture was taken last year by the signpost that said "L'Alpe Du Grand Serre" (the start of the REALLY BIG MOUNTAINS in the Alps. Thats why John is looking excited and a little scared!

Back to this year at the moment everything is so far so good. The ginger car is now the proud owner of an MOT certificate and we had a short test run on Sunday. It went well but we have decided to fit a new thermostat and a new top hose on the radiator. The car was running slightly hotter than we thought it should (it had a new radiator last year so it isn't that) it is more a case of being on the safe side - we really don't want an overheating car on our big adventure! That means this weekends work is organised!

Update on Ginger...

2011-06-16T06:36:00.000-07:00

It's less than four weeks before we set off and the ginger car is still in the garage! So far she has has had her electrics checked, her spotlights put back on, the cigarette lighter works again (and we need that for Sat Nav!!) and made the horn work again - we need that for the MOT!

We also had a bit of a problem with the battery draining itself overnight so obviously that was a top priority, I really did not want to ask a Ferrari driver if I could use his car to jumpstart ours every morning on the Cannonball Run!!!

Now every thing electrical is up and running so a big thank you to Phil Benson he did a brilliant job.

Now the car is at a different garage (Phil only does electrics)having last minute things done like a spot of welding on the sills, little bits and pieces and then an MOT. After all of that the car gets to come home and we get to test drive to make sure everything is ok before the adventure begins!

Would you like a pretty picture?

2011-06-14T07:27:00.000-07:00

We have been framing canvas pictures for nearly a year now! We sell them in our shop and they are a great success. We can now offer them to our internet customers! And of course at the same prices as the shop, i.e. no postage and packing! The beauty of these pictures is that they are completely personal as it is your picture that we frame.

You email us the image you want.

You tell us the size you would like.

We print the image onto canvas.

We frame the canvas.

And we put it in the post to you!

The only things you have to worry about is making sure the subject in the picture is not too close to the edge, as the framing involves wrapping the canvas around the bars, we don't want to chop the top of your head off!!!

The canvas pictures have been very popular (especially in the run up to Christmas) they are also very popular for birthdays. We have also done christenings and this morning framed a picture celebrating cycling from John O'Groats to Lands End! Anything to do with sporting achievements is also popular, we have done pictures of everything from cross country running, equestrian to ballet! Have a look and see what you would like done! You can find out more information by going to our website http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/PHOTO_CANVAS_PRINTING/PHOTO_CANVAS_PRINTING/

This is so new we haven't even got a button on the front page - but it is so exciting I just couldn't wait to tell you!

YAY! We have success!!!

2011-06-10T01:03:00.000-07:00

We had some really good news today! We are on the first page of Google!!!! We have been working very hard "behind the scenes" on SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and this is an incredible result!

We have been targeting certain key phrases they are:

EPSON INK T0715

EPSON INK CARTRIDGES T0715

EPSON T0715 MULTIPACK INK

I know that this doesn't make a huge difference to you dear customer (because you are already here!) but it will do a lot to get our name out there to new customers. And we are really excited about that!

Getting closer......

2011-05-31T06:36:00.000-07:00

It is getting more and more exciting the closer is gets to adventure time!!! We got a letter giving us pointers to remember before we set off, details about driving licence, maps etc, the letter itself is nothing to get bothered about, but at the same time it is SO EXCITING!!! How often do you get a letter about the Cannonball Run?? Don't forget we are doing all this for charity so if you feel you can donate even a little click here. You can read a bit about John, if you scroll down to the bottom you will find the Just Giving links. Thanks!

Epson compatible cartridges - pre order now!

2011-05-31T06:25:00.000-07:00

We finally have an arrival date for the new range of Epson compatible cartridges! We will have them in stock on MONDAY 20th JUNE! You can pre order them now, you can find T1285 here http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Epson_T1285_Compatible_Multipack_Free_UK_Delivery_on_all_orders_–_Prices_include_VAT/

We have had a very long wait for these compatible cartridges! The problem was the chip - manufacturing by hand worked perfectly, it was just mass producing them that caused a few headaches, it has all been worked out now, but that's what the delay was! You can find T1295 here http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Epson_T1295_Compatible_Multipack_Free_UK_Delivery_on_all_orders_–_Prices_include_VAT/ Don't forget you can pre order these cartridges now but they won't be posted until 20th June! Of course we always have the genuine cartridges in stock if you just can't wait! http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/index.php?p=catalog&mode=search&search_in=all&search_str=t128 http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/index.php?p=catalog&mode=search&search_in=all&search_str=t129

New Kodak Cartridges

2011-05-24T02:24:00.001-07:00

We now have in stock the new Kodak cartridges! The range consists of a standard black, extra large black, a colour cartridge and a twin pack which has a standard black and colour cartridge. The standard black is £9.50 and has a 335 page yield. You can find it at http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Kodak_30_Black_genuine_3952330/

The extra large black is £14.74 and has a yield of 670 pages. http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Kodak_30XLB_genuine_ink_cartridge_3952363/

Kodak 30 Colour is a tri colour cartridge with cyan, magenta and yellow ink. Yield is 390 pages. http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Kodak_30_Colour_genuine_8898033/

And finally the black and colour twin pack! Priced at £23.48, the yields are 335 pages for the black and 390 for the colour. http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Kodak_30_Combo_Pack._Black_Colour_8039745/

We have all these cartridges in stock today!

Win an iPad 2!

2011-05-20T01:02:00.001-07:00

To celebrate the changes we have made to our website we are giving away an iPad 2 (with Wi-Fi and 3G) worth £499!!! All you have to do to be in with a chance is write "IPAD PLEASE" in the promo box when you place your next order. The prize draw will take place on the 1st July 2011 and the winner (chosen at random) will be announced in the usual ways - on the blog, Facebook, Twitter and of course on our website. Go to our website to order and be in with a chance! http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/ Good luck!!!

We've been making changes!

2011-05-19T01:44:00.000-07:00

Here at KC INKS LTD we have been working very hard and have made some changes to our website, making in a lot easier for you to use! Here is a list of things we have improved;

You don't have to be registered any more - you can log in as a guest and shop!

One page checkout - this is a BIG ONE. No more jumping through hoops - one page and you are done!

You can review the cartridges, and read other customers reviews too!

You can look at your previous orders, making it much easier if you can't think of your cartridge number!

ONE THING HASN'T CHANGED - YOU STILL GET THE SAME SAVINGS, GREAT PRICES AND PERSONAL SERVICE!!!

So have a look and see if we have succeeded in making things a little easier for you! http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/

Epson Cleaning Cartridges

2011-05-18T01:20:00.000-07:00

We have finally managed to source some Epson cleaning cartridges for the T0715 range! They are very easy to use, you just take out the normal cartridge and put the cleaning cartridge into the same slot and set the printer on a cleaning/maintainence cycle. Instead of your ink levels going down, the flush in the cartridge is cleaning your print head! Of course you will only need a cleaning cartridge if you have a nozzle blocked or you feel like the printer needs a good clean. Here's the link to our page http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/Inkjet_Cartridges/Epson_T0711_T0714_Printer_Cleaning_Cartridges/

A heads up.

2011-05-06T08:21:00.000-07:00

This is a heads up for some news that we have been expecting for the last few weeks and is now happening. We have been notified by our suppliers that certain HP cartridges are now running low on stock as a result of the tragic earthquake and subsequent events in Japan. Unfortunately there is nothing we can do about it. The cartridges are HP350 (Standard and XL size), HP300 Black and Colour (Standard and XL sizes), HP338 Twin Packs, HP343 Twin Packs, and all HP363 Black (Standard and XL size), Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Light Cyan and Light Magenta. As I have said there is nothing we can do - I know it is a real inconvenience but spare a thought for the people in Japan, for example 15 people were injured in the Canon factory alone. I don't have information on the other brands at this time but considering that most of them are Japanese there will almost certainly be more shortages. So if you use any of these cartridges stock up now - we simply don't know when we will be getting more - we do have stocks of all the above cartridges so if you want them get them now! Don't worry you will be the first to know when we do eventually get them back in stock!

Epson Compatible Cartridges

2011-04-28T08:12:00.000-07:00

We have been trying to get compatible cartridges for the new Epson cartridges that came out before Christmas for some time now. Unfortunatly we still can't get them. Our suppliers have told us that the problem is with the chip on the cartridge. The difficulty is that the chip can be manufactured by hand but not mass produced and that is what is causing the hold up. More bad news is that they have no idea when the compatible cartridges will be ready - it could be next week if someone has a EUREKA! moment or two months if nobody has that lightbulb moment. On the plus side we do have the full range of the new genuine cartridges here are the links http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/products/Epson_T1281_Black_Genuine-1564-0.html http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/products/Epson_T1291_Black_High_Capacity_Genuine-1569-0.html http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/products/Epson_T1301_Black_Extra_High_Capacity_Genuine_C13T13014010-1594-0.html http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/products/A_THREE_PACK_OF_Epson_T1302_T1303_T1304_C_M_Y_Extra_High_Capacity_Genuine_T1306-1598-0.html The cartridges are T1281 (Black), T1282 (Cyan), T1283 (Magenta), T1284 (Yellow) and T1285 (Quad Pack). T1291 (Black), T1292 (Cyan), T1293 (Magenta), T1294 (Yellow) and T1295 (Quad Pack). T1301 (Black), T1302 (Cyan), T1303 (Magenta), T1304 (Yellow) and T1306 (Colour Triple Pack). I will keep you updated, as soon as I hear anything I will let you know - hopefully it will be soon!

The finished engine

2011-04-27T02:13:00.001-07:00

Finally on Sunday night about 8 o'clock we finished!

This is what we did:

Inlet Manifold

New Gaskets

Sump Plug

Core Plug - this was the worst!

Oil Change

New Oil Filter

Steering Wheel - we had it changed to a racing wheel last year because John couldn't get his knees under the original one - he is tall! The garage put the new one on squint so we straightened it!

New Air Filter

Changed the Points to an Electronic Ignition

New Distributor Cap

New HT Leads

New Spark Plugs

New Coil

Electrics

New Alloy Wheels and Tyres

New Chrome Rocker Covers

New Chrome K and N Air Filter (John is very excited about this - I don't know why?)

And finally putting some air in the new tyres! Jess has given up hope of us ever finishing and has gone to sleep!

The finished engine!!! Lots of chrome that I now have to polish. As you can see I haven't done it yet! The only thing left to do is the spacing on the tappets and to take the car for a test drive to make sure everything works. Wish us luck!

Engine work part 2

2011-04-27T01:55:00.001-07:00

We had a LOT to do to the car! Dad worked pretty much non stop for six days! I love this picture of John and Dad concentrating.
I don't know what John is doing - maybe he is inspecting our work! John is intent on growing some serious seventies side burns to match his seventies car. As long as he doesn't grow an afro and wear a tank top and bell bottoms I can just about cope!

These are the old fuses made out of porcelain. I have a big pack of spares just in case..... I would take a spare engine in the boot if it was possible because I just know something will go wrong and guess who will be trying to fix it yes little old me..... I can foresee tears and maybe a tantrum on the side of the road!

The engine in bits, the light you see is Dad's it is amazingly bright and you can stick it under the bonnet or on the side of the engine so your hands are free, I am definately going to get one!

This is the hole where the sump plug goes, it is very important as it keeps all the oil in the engine. We took it out to change the oil and the thread on the engine block was completely stripped so we couldn't put the sump plug back in. This was serious and could have scuppered everything - the annoying thing was that we actually had another sump but couldn't take the engine out of the car to change it - we didn't have the lifting equipment. We tried thread sealer but it didn't work. I then spent the day running around all the garages, tool shops and even tractor dealerships in Kendal (and may I add that everyone I talked to was extremely helpful - people in Kendal are lovely!) I eventually found what I was looking for - a heli coil or rethreader. So that was another hurdle overcome!

This is my best little helper Belle!

We did a lot to the car!

2011-04-27T00:56:00.001-07:00

Here is the evidence that we did lots of work on the car! Just to remind you it is a Ford Granada Mk 1 Ghia, it is John's pride and joy!
This is the engine with most of the top of it. We have removed the air intake and the rocker covers. Listen to me talking as if I know all about engines! I knew not much at all before last week but I really have learnt a lot!

This is a difficult picture to make out but it is the hole where we took the leaking core plug out, it is just below the black pipe, you can see where water has been running down the engine block. This was horrible to get out and even worse to get a new one back in!

Thats my Dad's hand, that is where the core plug is, it is on a difficult angle. It was one of those jobs that if the engine was out of the car or up on ramps it would have been a five minute job instead of an all day job! We won in the end though!

Two little helpers! Kara and Jess (the greyhound) as well as John and Dad's feet!

My Dad deserves a huge thank you!

2011-04-18T02:46:00.000-07:00

This is a slightly self indulgent post, but it is for a very good reason! As you all know we are going on the Cannonball Run this year. We are very excited but we had a few worries as the car had a new engine fitted this winter and there were a few problems - actually more like 50 million problems!!! Well I happened to know just the man for the job, it was just a case of getting him in the right place at the right time (I will explain why later) well my Dad arrived last Monday and was put straight to work with me as his helper! We finished the car last night (Sunday) we worked non stop! That is why there has been complete silence on the blog for a week! Dad and John on the way to a tea break! Meet Kenny Montgomery, he is a Marine Engineer and drives ships as his day job. I am his middle daughter, this is the first time in two and a half years that I have seen my Dad, whenever I go home to my parents house he is away we always miss each other. As you can imagine we have talked non stop for days!

Dad and me in our matching orange boiler suits, I have learnt so much, Dad is a very good and patient teacher, there was so much to do and even when I had had enough he carried on. Dad has spent a lifetime driving ships and is highly qualified, he has amazing stories to tell from all around the world. There really is nothing he can't do and he really encourages me to use my reasoning to work towards a solution. Dad is a perfectionist and will go to great lengths to make sure everything is spot on. I will do another post with details of all the things we changed/mended/hit with a big hammer!

This is the last ship my Dad drove, it is a tanker and he took it from Guangzhow (China) to Callao (Peru) it was not the best trip, lots went wrong instead of being a 40 day trip is ended up being 22 weeks! I think he was pleased to see the back of that one! John and I took my Dad to the train station this morning and once again I was reduced to a five year old girl saying goodbye to her Daddy as he went back to sea and cried buckets. He is going to hospital to have an operation on Wednesday so wish him luck. I cannot thank you enough Dad, not only have you saved us thousands of pounds, I know the work has been carried out to the highest standard. I am incredibly grateful and really appreciated the chance to have my Daddy all to myself for a whole week!

Are you ready for our BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!

2011-04-08T01:11:00.001-07:00

We are going on the Cannonball Run Europe!!!!!! We are going in our 1974 Mk 1 Ford Granada so that will be interesting! We are raising money for two charities The RFU Injured Players and Spinal Research. To find our more please visit our charity page http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/pages/Charity_Drive.html you will find links to our Just Giving pages, please donate if you feel able. We have been planning this for a couple of weeks now and honestly I thought I was going to burst with excitement, this really is a once in a lifetime experience! John and I will do our very best to raise as much money as possible, we will of course be keeping everyone up to date with our progress by blogging, doing videos, twitter and a webcam! I cannot tell you how excited we are (and a little scared!!) Wish us luck!

Where to find us.

2011-04-06T00:58:00.000-07:00

I got to thinking the other day after I gave you the Facebook links that I have never done a list of all the different places you can find out about us. So here it is! First and foremost our website http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/ here you can find out all about us and of course order your ink!

Ok so you probably already know about this one (as you are here reading about it!) Our blog - we also have another two blogs though, both on our website. The first one is BLOG, NEWS AND TIPS and is similar to this (but slightly different!) http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/pages/blog.html the other is very different, it is about our charity drive (as yet I still can't reveal too many details) http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/pages/Charity_Drive.html although if you visit just now it will let the cat out of the bag as we have put a certain logo on there!

We have two Facebook pages http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/KC-Inks/110791988941755 and http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Ink-Cartridges-UK/177969185563592 we put all sorts of stuff on there, competitions, giveaways, offers have a look you might be surprised!

We are also on Twitter - this took some getting used to (I still think we should be allowed to write a 3000 word essay on there!!) but at least my little tweets are entertaining (I think!) https://twitter.com/KCinks

And last but not least our Youtube channel. I gave John a new video to put up (editing is completely beyond me!) so that should be going up soon. We have a mixture of interesting, informative and downright silly videos up there, we are adding more all the time. http://www.youtube.com/user/KCinksLtd Have fun looking at everything!

Facebook links as promised.

2011-04-04T01:17:00.000-07:00

Here are the links to our Facebook pages, yes we have two - I think it is to keep me on my toes! Have a look, we put lots of interesting things on there as well as offers, giveaways and competitions to enter, we have had some really great prizes over the last couple of years including a weeks holiday in France! So friend us and you never know what you might win!

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/KC-Inks/110791988941755

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Ink-Cartridges-UK/177969185563592

We have winners!

2011-04-01T09:04:00.001-07:00

We have winners!!! First prize (the espresso machine) goes to Lili Hurst, the Kodak Photo frames go to Neil Fletcher, Sarah Montgomery and Denise Helen Ward. They were picked out of all the people who friended us on our two Facebook pages, I will put up links in the next post. Well done everyone!

The suspense is killing me!!!

2011-03-30T02:12:00.000-07:00

We have had some real ups and downs at work in the last week and a bit. We have had some bad news that has turned into REALLY EXCITING GOOD news........ I have to wait to have it all confirmed before we tell the world! I know this is annoying for you, but it will be worth the wait! I am so excited about this I couldn't sleep last night!

Wind up those clocks!

2011-03-29T00:50:00.000-07:00

Did you all remember to change your clocks? Here at KC INKS all but one of us did.... we phoned Tommy at 9.15 and made him panic! Poor Tommy was full of the cold all weekend and never gave it a thought, luckily he is feeling better now - I say lucky because we all spent the day teasing him! Apart from Tommy (!) we are all on the ball and ready to leap into action and take your orders, http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/ place your orders and look for them in the post the very next day! We really are as quick as that!

Twin Packs!

2011-03-25T03:01:00.000-07:00

We now have some twin packs in stock, we started getting them about two months ago but the supply has been a bit hit and miss so we decided to wait until it had calmed down before we told everyone we had them! It would have been awful if I had told everyone and then when you tried to order there weren't any!
We have Canon PG-40+CL41 £34.74. So you are saving nearly £5! PG-40 is £18.24 and CL-41 is £21.34. Of course we also have the refilled cartridges as well, here is a link to our website so you can have a look http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/index.php?p=toner_ink_finder&cid=8&pmid=570

HP also has a twin pack for HP350+HP351 £23.15. Saving a massive £7.81!!! HP350 £14.34 and HP351 £16.62. We also have the XL cartridges and of course the refilled cartridges as well here is a link http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/index.php?p=toner_ink_finder&cid=362&pmid=465 I hope this is helpful!

Things to make us happy!

2011-03-22T05:58:00.000-07:00

I can't tell you how happy it makes us all here at KC Inks to get feed back (bad and good, but hopefully good!) So when we get an email like this one it makes our day! Here is what a lovely customer had to say.

Hello

I recently bought an HP printer and went to your site to see if you stocked the relevant inks. I found that you do. Now here is the good part! Before I could order them my printer ran out of ink so I ordered them around 5pm. I was amazed and truly grateful when the order turned up the following morning.

Thank you so much for your amazing service. I look forward to many years happy trading with you and I'll pass on your company details to my daughters and encourage them to use you too.

We really do try very hard to give the best service we possibly can!

Our first BIG test...

2011-03-21T08:05:00.000-07:00

If only the road ahead was as straight and clear as this one! We have had our first BIG TEST. I know you all think that surely it is the second one after all I wrote about a hiccup with Ginger just the other day.... Ginger can be mended! The tour company that we had booked the trip with have just cancelled! So we were faced with a decision to either give up or get on with it and organise it ourselves. Well we are not ones for giving up so we have started with the preparations! I am feeling a little daunted because now I have to plan routes, find hotels etc as well as organising all fund raising side! At least we have a bit of time between now and July, it will fly past though! We also have a charity blog page on our website now there is not much up there yet (yes it is another thing for yours truly) I will be posting all sorts of things on there in the coming weeks. Here's a link http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/pages/Charity_Blog.html Let me know what you think!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

2011-03-17T06:22:00.001-07:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I thought I would go with a not so typical picture - it is from Cheltenham Festival! Four days of racing and hopefully good weather. With Danny in New Zealand we are not following as closely as we normally would be (he is John's son and a jockey in case you didn't know) The rivalry between who wins the most between English and Irish trainers is legendary at Cheltenham, so far this year Ireland are in the lead....

Introducing Ginger and our first hiccup...

2011-03-16T02:47:00.000-07:00

I thought it was about time to introduce you to the most important(!) part of our team, meet GINGER! She is a 1974 MK1 Ford Granada and is John's pride and joy. She came into John's life last spring and he has lavished much love and car polish on her, he polishes the top and I do the bottom bits that he can't manage! And yes it is the same car that was in the Sweeney, we get lots of comments about that! Alas though we have had our first hiccup. We decided to put a new engine in Ginger and went to pick her up last Saturday. John was very excited, he hadn't even SEEN his car for a couple of months! We stopped to fill up with petrol and just as we started again we had an enormous backfire which managed to blow the exhaust apart at the seams! Luckily we were two seconds from the garage so it was straight back in, sounding like a tank! The engine seemed to be running fine but there must have been a reason for a buildup to cause such a big backfire so she is staying in the garage to find out the problem. Ah well thats old cars for you! Have a look at our charity page to find out why I am telling you about an old car! http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/pages/Charity_Drive.html

This week I have needed the matchsticks....

2011-03-10T05:10:00.000-08:00

I am very sorry for the complete lack of any sort of communication via social media this week. I have not been slacking honestly! In fact the complete opposite, we have been working very hard on the website. The bad thing is that it is all "behind the scenes" work so you can't see what we've been doing.... but we have done a LOT!

I took a picture of my computer screen just to prove I am not making it up! This is a peek at what the back of the website looks like, we have been adding links onto each and every page on the website - every single cartridge and printer!

It is very boring repetitive work, we started last Sunday and have been coming into work early everyday since as well, this morning I was here before the car park opened! Luckily I didn't have to wait long. We are about half way through, roll on the weekend! Next week will be fun as well it is STOCK TAKE!!

2011-03-02T02:55:00.000-08:00

We have just pressed the button and sent out our latest email about our BIG ADVENTURE in July! One thing that I think is very important to point out is that the actual journey has been paid for by ourselves. All the money you donate will be divided equally between Spinal Research and The RFU Injured Players Foundation. And of course if you have received your email you will know about the exciting prize draw we have put together! A YEARS FREE INK!!!! Now you can't get better than that! So get going and fingers crossed you are the lucky winner!
Here are the links to our Just Giving pages http://www.justgiving.com/KC-Inks-Ltd http://www.justgiving.com/KC-INKS I know the links look the same but they are to different pages, one for each charity. Also here is the link to the charity blog page on our website http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/pages/Charity_Drive.html I know it is a long way from July but there will be plenty of background work going on before then!

Happy St Davids day!

2011-03-01T06:36:00.001-08:00

Happy St Davids Day! And what a glorious spring day it is to celebrate it! Beautiful blue skies with hardly a cloud in sight! Of course with us being in the Lake District we are famous for our daffodils too (thanks to the poet William Wordsworth) we even have daffodil watch on the local news! Hope you are having a lovely day that feels like the beginning of Spring!

John

2011-02-24T01:23:00.000-08:00

I promised I would tell you about John and why we are going to be raising money for Spinal Research and RFU Injured Players Foundation. As you probably know by now John is the boss here at KC Inks. I am his wife Sally, John likes to tell everyone that I am the real boss but it isn't true! The RFU Injured Players Foundation in partricular is a charity very close to our hearts and for a very good reason. John suffered a devastating injury playing rugby when he was still at school (a month after his sixteenth birthday) and was told he would be completely paralysed. This happened in 1980 before the time of MRIs etc. In those dark old days the doctors really struggled with this type of injury because the equipment needed just wasn't available. Fortunately for John his spinal cord was crushed not severed so he did regain movement. It was a very long hard struggle and even now he doesn't talk that much about his time in hospital (Lodge Moor near Sheffield - it's not there now!) John had to relearn how to do everything and can walk, tie his own bootlaces, write, drive a car and answer the phone to talk to all our lovely customers. He was in hospital for a year and came out in a wheelchair. He has extensive nerve damage and therefore has very little sensation anywhere on his body apart from the top of his shoulders and head. He was incredibly determined and a year after he came out of hospital (when he was nearly eighteen) he attended Kendal College and did a Business Studies course - all without his wheelchair! I have included some pictures but they are all from more recent times.

John and the other love of his life Kara. She is Belgian/German Shepherd and when you phone John at work she is right by his side!

John and his greatest achievments in life - his two sons Danny and Ben. They are sitting in what John calls his "off road golf buggy" John can go places that would not otherwise be possible without it!

This picture really does show how determined John is! He is sitting in a digger! It was a real operation getting John into the digger as it had REALLY high steps but he wanted to do it so he got on with it (we helped!) He was a dab hand at driving it as well!

Now I think John might love this car more than he loves me. It is a 1974 Ford Granada. It is perfect for John as it is automatic and has loads of space. John is 6'1 so needs that extra legroom! This is the car that we will be driving this summer and I will tell you more about the EPIC DRIVE in another post.

I have not gone into huge detail about John's injury on purpose because words cannot really convey the enormity of what happened. It also cannot begin to give you an idea of the struggle John faces doing things that you and I take for granted. His "official title" is C4/C5 Quadriplegic. It is an amazing achievment that he gets to work in the morning (and that he is working at all!) Spinal Research is doing amazing work and the RFU Injured Players Foundation has helped us and we feel that we could try and give something back and this is something John can do so we are going for it!

A sneak preview of the road ahead

2011-02-24T00:56:00.001-08:00

Some of you may remember John and I decided to go on a driving holiday last year. Well we have decided to do the same again this year but this time we are going to raise money for charity at the same time. WHAT?!?! I hear you all say - why would anyone pay good money for you to go on holiday? We are going to raise money for two charities, Spinal Research and RFU Injured Players Foundation. I will tell you the reasons why and John's story in the next post. We are setting off in July on the drive of a lifetime across Europe. You will be hearing a lot about it in the next few months!

Teacher's Pet!

2011-02-21T03:03:00.001-08:00

John really is the teacher's pet this week. Quite honestly he is in danger of becoming a bore with the amount he goes on about the Youtube channel. You see John is in charge of it and we in the office have been hearing about everything he is learning. John is very committed and is very excited about the whole thing - he nearly hit the roof when he managed to turn the background orange! So for the love of all things orange (and my sanity!) take a look at our channel and maybe leave a comment? When John got the first comment on a video it was like Christmas! So make his day, have a look and write something nice! http://www.youtube.com/user/KCinksLtd

Yay! We have progress!

2011-02-10T04:11:00.000-08:00

John has worked miracles and we have videos up on our Youtube channel!!!! I made a short and sweet video this morning (with the help of Tommy) about how to change a cartridge in a Brother printer and now its out there for the world to see!!! John has put up three videos, two helpful, one with nothing to do with cartridges, but it should make you laugh..... and yes that is me having a bit of a panic! Here is the link so you can have a look. http://www.youtube.com/user/KCinksLtd

Working it out slowly...

2011-02-09T01:55:00.000-08:00

Like the tortoise our latest venture is progressing slowly as we learn "on the job" We are now the proud owners of a channel on Youtube, the challenge is actually getting some more videos up! We have lots of great ideas in the pipeline, and hopefully you will find our videos to be useful and maybe even fun too! If you have any ideas for videos you would like us to do let us know! Email sally@kc-inks.co.uk and I will do my best to get it done! Here is the link to our Youtube channel, we will make it look all lot more exciting over the next few days! http://www.youtube.com/KCinksLtd

The lowdown on Advent printers

2011-02-03T07:39:00.000-08:00

My advice (and remember it is my opinion) is DON'T DO IT! Advent is a new brand launched by PC World, the actual manufacturing is done by Kodak. Now this should be a winning formula right? Well no. Once again I am back to the old "look at the price of the cartidges before you buy a printer" There are three printers in the Advent range, the A10, AW10 and AWP10. Now you can buy the most expensive for under £70 - doesn't that sound like a bargain? Have you seen the price of the ink? At first glance it isn't so bad until you realise the actual quantity of ink you receive for your hard earned money. It makes no mention on the PC World website, I had to do a bit more digging to find that the Black - £12.99 - will do 225 pages and the Colour - £18.99 - will do 250 pages. Now HP also do this "how many pages rather than the actual mls" and through my prior knowledge of that I know that 250 pages is approx 5mls. Thats a teaspoon. So the Advent Black cartridge has less than a teaspoon and the colour has approx a teaspoon DIVIDED INTO THREE COLOURS. So the colour cartridge is not going to be lasting very long at all! The lovely people at www.trustedreviews.com have put it far better than I could, this is quoted from their site.

"PC World has done a good job working with Kodak to produce a low-cost, colour inkjet, with a good range of features for the price, fair speed and above average print quality. It's then scuppered the project by pricing the consumables at a stupidly high level. The kind of people who buy an inexpensive printer are those who are going to get very cross when they discover they'll have to pay half the cost of the machine again for every 250 pages they print."

To add insult to injury you can only buy the cartridges from PC World and Curry's (they are owned by the same company) This means they can keep the price artificially high. You can get compatibles but here's the bad news - they are very poor quality. We have trialled them and we were shocked by how bad they were so obviously we will not be stocking them.

So my advice is the same as that for Lexmark printers and for the same reasons. They reel you in with a cheap printer, then take all your money on the cartridges. DON'T DO IT. Buy a Brother, your wallet will thank you in the long run!

New Month, New Comparisons (well I tried!)

2011-02-01T07:47:00.000-08:00

I thought I would get ahead of the game and do some price comparisons today. Well it turns out I am a long way ahead of the game because I have actually struggled to find comparisons to do! A lot of our competitors don't seem to have some of the newer cartridges or they are out of stock. I have put three up just so you know I have actually done something!

Canon PG-40+CL-41 Twin Pack. This is one of the ones I have struggled with and that is a surprise because these are not brand new cartridges, they have been out for a couple of years. Asda, Tesco WH Smith and Viking either had no stock or just plain didn't list it. Luckily we have it in stock and a good price too - £34.74. We also have the individual cartridges PG-40 (Black) £18.24 and CL-41 (Colour) £21.34, but if you buy the twin pack you are saving £4.84.

Brother LC-985 Quad pack. This is a new range of cartridges from Brother. Once again Asda, Tesco, WH Smith and Viking didn't have a single thing on any of their websites about the LC-985. We have not only the quad pack but the single cartridges and the compatible cartridges too! LC-985 Quad pack is £37.20 and the compatible quad pack is £14.99.

Epson T0715. At last we have comparisons!

Asda £33.00 + £4.95 delivery = £37.95 (out of stock when I looked this morning)

Tesco £35.71 + £5.00 delivery = £40.71

WH Smith £38.39

Viking Price shown excluding VAT £27.19, with VAT - £32.62 + £3.40 delivery = £36.02

KC INKS £35.12

We also have the compatible quad pack at £14.99. And remember NO POSTAGE AND PACKING! You only pay for the cartridges!

I was hoping to be able to do a comparison on a new cartridge from each of the different brands, I gave up because otherwise this would have been a long post just listing our prices! Some of the ones I tried to compare are - Canon CLI-521 Pack, HP901, Epson T1285 and Kodak 10 Twin pack. I think I will try again in another few weeks to give everyone else a chance to catch up! We really do our best to save you money and pride ourselves for having a friendly, efficient FAST service to go with it!

A nice surprise in our inbox this morning!

2011-01-28T01:07:00.000-08:00

We had a lovely email waiting for us when we got to work this morning. Here is some of what it said.

"I would just like to say a big thank you for the advice you gave me when I contacted you on Monday about problems I was having with the cartridges for my Epson RX620 printer. I have always found you to be very helpful, as well as your prices to be very competitive. It is rare today to receive such good "old fashioned" service these days."

Its lovely to get a thank you in the morning!

VIP Club - how to get in!

2011-01-18T05:45:00.000-08:00

I'll give you a clue.....it isn't difficult! All you have to do is email John john@kc-inks.co.uk and he will add you to the list!

What are the benefits? We email our customers regularly (not sixteen times a day though, we don't harrass you!) and let you know of any deals etc that might be useful to you. For example we sometimes do multibuys so if you buy 3 cartridges you receive 1 free, or you buy 5 cartridges you get 2 free (i.e you get 4 cartridges when you paid for 3, or you get 7 cartridges when you paid for 5) Does that make sense?

We also do more fun things as well! Giveaways are always popular, we try and actually give you things that are useful and you will actually WANT.

We tend to blog about all the lovely giveaways the day after we email our customers. This is because we want to give our VIP customers the chance to get the email (maybe when they get home from work) and order before everyone else. There is nothing more annoying than responding to an offer and being told "sorry there's none left"

So there you have it. If you want to be first in line for exciting stuff let John know!

First offering of the year - its a good un!!!

2011-01-18T05:29:00.000-08:00

Lets bring this year in with a smile! We have an amazing giveaway for you - we thought the first one of the year should be a REALLY good one! If you spend more than £35 you will receive a Pay As You Go mobile internet dongle loaded with 3GB data allowance, normally retailing at £30.99. Enter the code FREEBY in the promotional box when you place your order.

Spend less then £35 (and enter the code FREEBY in the promotional box) and you will receive a Pilot Spotliter doble ended (pink and yellow!) highlighter pen.

Get your orders in pronto, this is a first come first served offer! Our VIP customers are all over this one so get in there fast. If you want to become a VIP customer, I will tell you in the next post!

Just in case you didn't get the news

2011-01-11T07:32:00.001-08:00

I think our biggest news of the year so far got a bit lost in the last post. We have absorbed the VAT increase on all our compatible cartridges!!!

COMPATIBLE CARTRIDGES HAVE STAYED THE SAME PRICE AS 2010!!!

We are doing our very best to save you as much money as possible. We have also tried our hardest to keep the cost of refilled cartridges and toners and genuine cartridges down as much as we can. So hopefully more pennies can stay in your piggy bank!

V.A.T

2011-01-10T06:38:00.000-08:00

Well it has happened. We have completed the price changes. What a horrible job it was! We have done our very best to absorb the price increase but inevitablely prices have gone up on the majority of genuine cartridges. The good news is that we have managed to keep the price of compatible cartridges as near as possible the same as before. Welcome to 2011!

Happy New Year!

2011-01-10T06:32:00.000-08:00

Sorry this is slightly late (darn VAT price changes!) but may I take this opportunity to wish you all the very best for 2011, I hope that it is the simply the best year for you. Here's hoping that the price of ink cartridges goes down not up!

Happy Christmas to one and all!

2010-12-24T03:01:00.001-08:00

Happy Christmas! I wish that all your dreams come true and you have the most beautiful, peaceful Christmas ever. Enjoy the holidays and take the time to appreciate your loved ones and make the most of them. Spare a thought for all the people who are apart from their loved ones at this time. Season's greetings and have a lovely day!

Hurry - don't miss out!

2010-12-16T02:59:00.001-08:00

I have sad news, I have just come out of a (very detailed) meeting about the VAT increases that are coming in at the start of the year. VAT is going up to 20%. So the sensible thing to do is buy your supplies now to avoid paying all that extra money! Hurry while there is still time!

Still plenty of time to order your ink.

2010-12-15T01:24:00.000-08:00

As always we are posting right up until Christmas. The Post Office has the 21st down as the last post for Christmas delivery. We will continue posting up to the 23rd, but obviously you won't get it for Christmas! It does mean if you are running low you should get your order by the end of the year. Get those orders organised in time!

Getting ready for Christmas!

2010-12-09T07:36:00.000-08:00

We have been very busy today putting Christmas decorations up in the shop. It looks lovely, even if I do say so myself! We are so lucky being near to a main Post Office (thats how we get your cartridges to you so quickly!) and it also means we can keep posting right up until the last minute! It is still all systems go on the "posting out your packages" front!

We Have Winners!!!!

2010-11-24T01:05:00.000-08:00

At last! Announcing the lucky winners of our biggest giveaway to date, so with no further ado....

HP LAPTOP

Catriona G, Fort August.

BROTHER QL-570 LABELLER

Anthony B, Peterborough.

RUSSELL HOBBS ESPRESSO

Carl S, Sheffield.

Jackie O'B, London.

BROTHER DCP-197C PRINTER

Neil P, Reading.

SPACEWORX LETTER RACK AND TRAY

Amanda S, Abercynon.

Daniel P, Strensall.

Deborah W, Shropshire.

IXL STRONGBOX

Peter N, Biggleswade.

Elizabeth F, Shrewsbury.

PENTEL ENERGEL PEN

Jenny M, Brackley.

Wilf J, Southampton.

Sean S, Montrose.

Edward A, York.

Ernest W, Penrith.

We will be posting out all your exciting prizes today! Well done to all our winners and watch this space we will be doing it all again soon!

Registration prize draw - the goodies!!!!

2010-10-27T02:34:00.000-07:00

WOW! Here we have the list of prizes we have to give away on the 15th November to fifteen lucky people! As you know from the email, you don't have to purchase anything to be in with a chance. Because everyone is having to reregister (and we know its a pain!) we wanted to offer something that would make it more bearable for you! So with no further ado lets have a look at the goodies!! First up is the big one, a HP LAPTOP! It is a HP G62-a22SA laptop PC. The spec is really quite impressive, it features: Windows 7, Intel Pentium Processor P6000, 3GB memory, 250 GB hard drive, 15.6" HD Brighview LED screen, wireless networking, Bluetooth and a webcam. Value is £399, we have 1 to give away!

Next up a Brother QL-570 Labeller. This is a really amazing labeller. It supports barcode printing, has an automatic cutter, prints 68 standard labels per minute, there are different label widths available and it is SO easy to change the reels. I speak from experience, we have one in our office and it has blown me away (and I am not so easy to impress!) We even use it for printing shelf edge labels over a meter long! Value is £109, we have 1 to give away.

Russell Hobbs Caffe Torino Espresso. This is a 15 bar pump pressure espresso maker. It has a 1.1 litre capacity, with removable water tank, detachable drip tray and a steam nozzle (for frothing and warming milk for cappuccino). There are also two espresso cups provided! I like this machine, you can get a good strong cup of coffee and you can use the milk cold straight out of the fridge and still get a good froth! Value is £79.99, we have 2 to give away. DCP-197C All-In-One Printer. What can I say, this is our most popular printer BY FAR. It boasts a compact size for your desktop, 27ppm colour printing and 33 ppm mono printing. Up to A4 borderless printing and takes individual inks (black, cyan, magenta and yellow) saving you money by only replacing the ink that you need. It has a high resolution colour scanner and you can print direct from camera via the PictBridge connection. USB Host and Media Card Centre (print and scan) and includes FREE document management software. And last but certainly not least it is EnergyStar certified meaning lower energy usage. We have put this printer through the rigours of a busy office enviroment and it has never let us down. Value £73.80, we have 1 to give away.

Spaceworx Wood and Metal Letter Tray and Letter Holder. Ok I confess I love having really nice things on my desk (I'm a girl what do you expect!) I saw these and fell in love with them. Now my desk looks pretty and yours can too. I have to add they are not girly so looks good on a mans desk as well! Value approx £30, we have 3 to give away.

IXL Strongbox. Polycarbonate constuction, key retaining lock, removable coin tray and removable document holder. If you have to transport valuables do it safely, I even took one of these on our recent trip across France (see post further down). Value approx £15, we have 2 to give away.

Pentel Energel Sterling Liquid Gel Rollerball Pen. This is a really nice pen, it is 0.7mm medium rollerball with quick drying ink and its refillable. I recently went to a seminar and used this pen and I didn't get that fatigue you get from writing non stop all day! Value approx £8, we have 5 to give away.

So there you have it, I hope you like the selection and it just remains for me to say a sincerely heartfelt thank you for putting up with all the changes and I hope you like the new design. Please do get in touch if you have any problems and good luck with the prize draw! I will post a list of the winners here on 15th November.

New Brother Cartridges.

2010-10-27T01:03:00.000-07:00

LC-985. Available individually and in a quad pack. I like the new designs of the packaging, with the moon, sun and earth.

New HP cartridges.

2010-10-27T01:01:00.001-07:00

Hp 301 Black and colour. Once again the colours are in a block cartridge (all in together) so if one runs out you have to change the cartridge. When will they learn?

New Canon cartridges.

2010-10-27T00:56:00.000-07:00

The large black is PGI-525 and the small black and colours are CLI-526.

Finally the new release cartridges are all here!

2010-10-13T02:39:00.001-07:00

Autumn is always an exciting time of year with all the new cartridges for all the new printers being released just in time for Christmas! As always I will do individual posts for each brand. Epson have three sets of cartridges out that at first glance seem to be the same cartridge but in three different sizes (medium, large and extra large) but BE WARNED, this is not the case, there are only a couple of printers listed that take different sizes.
Not sure about the packaging on this one! I don't fancy Mr Fox looking daggers at me! I quite often get customers asking for the picture on the front and the colour (i.e a black duck) so now I will be asked for a pink fox!

Very Garden Of Eden. Blue apple anyone?Lots of discussion on this one. John is adamant that it is a reindeer even though it is blatantly obvious it is a red deer. If you are phoning us and get to talk to John just say "it's a red deer ok" it will make his day!

Sorry for the silence....

2010-10-01T03:16:00.000-07:00

I am sorry that I haven't been putting up the winners every day like I promised, but there have been a couple of hiccups that took over slightly! Don't worry we are still sending out the Kodak Digital Photo Frames and Papermate pens every day, we have nearly run out and we are deciding what to do for our next giveaway! Exciting stuff!!

Posting prizes.

2010-09-28T03:18:00.001-07:00

Putting a Kodak 7" Digital Photo Frame in the post to Northern Ireland. We are giving away Papermate pens with any order (while stocks last) and a photo frame once a day. All you have to do is place an order to be in with a chance! Hurry we will only be running this for one more week!

Mondays winner is...

2010-09-28T02:45:00.000-07:00

Mrs M from Belfast! Congratulations, a Kodak 7" Photo Frame is on it's way to you. To find out more see http://www.kc-inks.co.uk/

We have our first winner!

2010-09-24T07:06:00.001-07:00

The first winner of the Kodak 7" Digital Photo Frame is......

Mr P from Seathwaite!

Congratulations, check back to see if you have won after the next draw on Monday!

The next wave of freebies is here!

2010-09-23T06:36:00.000-07:00

Ok so we are on the next lot of goodies! For any order placed you will receive a Papermate Flexigrip Gel 0.7 pen (blue ink).

The best bit is........... every day we will put all order numbers into a draw. One lucky person's order will be drawn and they will receive a Kodak 7" Didital Photo Frame! Completely at random - get your orders in!

We made it home!

2010-09-22T02:05:00.000-07:00

What an adventure! We saw lakes...

Drove on beautiful avenued roads....

Went up high mountain passes ( I am ashamed to admit that I cried - 7,500 feet, the road the width of the car and no barriers...)

Even above the clouds...

Down into ravines...

And over scary bridges...

There will be a video of the Col du Turini soon!

A short break...

2010-09-09T00:39:00.001-07:00

I will not be writing anything for the next ten days or so because I am off on my holidays! John and I are going on a big adventure, we are driving across France to Monte Carlo......... in a 1974 Ford Granada! That makes the car five years older than me, and with John being on crutches I am the lucky person who gets to mend the car if it breaks down! I don't know how! So if you don't see a new post in just over a weeks time it will be because we have broken down on top of the Alps. Wish us luck!

Price Comparisons

2010-09-07T03:38:00.001-07:00

Here are some price comparisons you might find interesting! These prices are correct on 07/09/10. All comparisons are for the Epson T0715 genuine (as pictured above) and compatible quad packs.

First up the genuine cartridge comparison.

Asda £34.47 + £4.95 delivery = £39.42

Tesco £34.98 + £5.00 delivery = £39.98

WH Smith £37.76

Viking £33.47 + £3.40 delivery = £36.87

KC INKS £34.23 FREE FIRST CLASS DELIVERY!

Even without delivery we are cheaper than everyone else! You can't count Viking because you HAVE to order and have it delivered with them! Our free delivery is first class, you should get your parcel the next day!

Now the compatible price comparisons (remember this is for a quad pack 1 black and 3 colours)

Asda £18.92 + £4.95 delivery = £23.87

Tesco £20.99 = £5.00 delivery = £25.99

WH Smith don't do compatibles.

Viking £26.78 + 3.40 = £30.18

KC INKS £14.99 FREE FIRST CLASS DELIVERY!

WOW! Now that really is a lot of savings! Our compatible cartridges generally contain more than double the amount of ink compared to the genuine cartridges. And remember we haven't lowered our prices to make them look more attractive to you, these are the prices that we have held at this level for most of this year! So happy shopping....

Brother

2010-09-06T01:45:00.001-07:00

KC Inks Ltd are a Brother Approved Independant Retailer. I thought you might like to know a little background and why we chose Brother and not somebody else. The information about Brother is taken from their own website.

The company was incorporated in 1934. Based in Nagoya, Japan they now have offices throughout the world and manufacturing plants in Japan, Taiwan, Korea, America, Malaysia, Ireland and the UK. Brother has operations in 28 countries and is sold in more than 100 countries.

The UK subsidiary began in 1959 in London, but moved to Manchester in 1968, into a sewing machine factory (Brother don't just make printers you know!) The Manchester office is the headquarters of Brother Europe. Brother also has a factory in Ruabon, Wales making typewriters. The Manchester office also provides sales, marketing, technical support, warehousing and distribution and a customer support call centre. I think that the British call centre is SO IMPORTANT - speaking to somebody in this country who understands relieves so much of the associated frustration!

Brother also has an ISO9001 which is an internationally recognized standard for Quality Management Systems which includes; quality of service and repair, consistency of order processing, operational controls and customer liason procedures. They recently won the Microscope ACES award for "Environmental Company of the Year" Brother were the ONLY printer manufacturer to be nominated. Another accolade was scoring 100/100 in the "Ethical Company Organisation Good shoppong Guide" for the fourth year in a row!

There are a couple of reasons why KC Inks chose to affiliate with Brother. First of all customer service. I firmly believe that good service (with a smile) is the way forward in any business. Make everyone happy! I have found Brother to be very good to deal with.

Secondly from my own experiences. A long time ago I bought a Brother fax machine, not very expensive, just to plod away at the back of the office. Then one day I printed out some holiday snaps on it.... and they came out really well! Then I did a photo album for a friends birthday, again very good results. Which I thought for a little fax machine was rather good. Since then we have gradually replaced all the printers (inkjet and laser) in the office with Brother and we are of course very pleased with them. All because of that first little fax....

Brother Printers

2010-08-26T00:44:00.001-07:00

Brother printers are well built and have a wide range of specifications to suit most requirements. They all take brand new replacement inks and the cartridges do not have microchips on them. They are multi cartridge machines and work well with compatible inks. The cartridges hold a good amount of ink with little wastage and I believe are the best value per page when using compatible inks. Brother printers have fixed print heads that clog up over time causing banding (lines from left to right on your printout) and complete blocking. The only remedy is to do regular print head cleaning from new, don't wait until you have a problem. Using the compatible ink will probably shorten the life of your printer but by the time it happens you should have saved enough money to replace it several times over.
Our experience points us to believe that Brother printers are currently the best choice of printers on the grounds of quality of manufacture, quality of output and most importantly the cost of printing. We have a lot of printers (laser and inkjet) in our office and they are all (bar one specialist printer) Brother. We started off with an assortment of every brand and have gradually replaced them all with Brother printers as they have either broken, gone wrong or the cost of cartridges has become to high. I will tell you a bit more about Brother in another post.

Lexmark Printers

2010-08-23T02:16:00.001-07:00

Lexmark printers mostly have the print head built into the ink cartridge. These printers are cheap to buy but tend to be expensive to buy replacement inks for. A lot of people once they have purchased a cheap printer are shocked to find that one set of replacement inks cost more than the printer did! You wouldn't believe how many people come into the shop and find out the price and watching their faces fall when they realise that their printer is not a bargain after all is horrible. Lexmark also restrict where they sell certain cartridge models to keep the price unrealistically high and also try to restrict the supply of recycled cartridges to the remanufacturers for the same reason. Remanufactured cartridges are available but only for a couple of product lines, meaning you have to buy the genuine cartridges, there is no alternative. Lexmark printers mainly take two cartridges (one black one colour) so you are back to the old problem of when one colour ink runs out you have to replace the whole cartridge, throwing out ink in the process and wasting money. The printers themselves are good quality but the price of running them is prohibitive. The phrase I hear most when a customer is buying a set of Lexmark inks is "it would be cheaper to buy a new printer" and guess what it is TRUE! So my best advice is not to buy a Lexmark and save yourself some pennies!

Canon Printers

2010-08-19T01:36:00.000-07:00

Canon are another quality make of printer witha mix of ink cartridge types. The multi cartridge printers take the brand new replacement cartridges, which seem to be very reliable. Some people sell replacement cartridges that do not have a microchip on - these are very cheap and you have to take the microchip off the genuine cartridge and put it on the replacement, this is not a satisfactory solution. If the microchip has the slightest little mark or scratch it won't work and you have wasted your money. These printers have fixed print heads that clog up over time causing banding (lines from left to right on your printout) and eventually complete blocking. The only remedy is to do regular print head cleaning from new, don't wait until you have a problem. The majority of these printers have replaceable print heads, when the print head will not clear by doing multiple print head cleans you can easily remove the whole print head. This allows you to soak the print head in tepid water (boiled and then cooled to make sure it is pure) to try to dissolve the dried inks and clear the jets. Try to do this in a way that does not damage the contacts and try not to get covered in ink! When you get to this stage it is kill or cure so its worth a go and is surprisingly effective and can be done several times successfully if you are careful. If this does not work replacement print heads are available for most printers from Canon but you will have to weigh up the benefits as they can be as expensive as buying a new printer.
Canon also do a range of printers that take two cartridges one black one colour (cyan, magenta, yellow). As explained before the big disadvantage of these cartridges is when one compartment is empty you have to change the cartridge, it will not print if you have run out of one colour. This means throwing away ink. There are remanufactured cartridges available but again they are dependant on supply of recycled genuine cartridges and are more expensive than brand new replacement cartridges.
Canon printers offer very good photographic quality, the nearest you can get to professional imaging. So if you are a keen amatuer photographer Canon would be a good choice, but of course you have to pay good money to get the quality, so it is not a cheap option.

HP Printers

2010-08-18T06:59:00.001-07:00

OK back to business. Hewlett Packard (HP) are a quality make of printer with a wide range of models to suit most requirements. Many of the printers have the print head built into the ink cartridge. The genuine ink cartridges are widely available and quite expensive. The remanufactured cartridges are readily available and are generally good value compared to the genuine cartridges. The remanufactured cartridges are fairly reliable, they are not as cheap or as reliable as the brand new replacements that are available for other types of printer. As the remanufactured cartridges depend on recycled cartridges there is usually a lag of up to a year from the time a new model of cartridge is launched to sufficient empty cartridges being available to make the remanufactured cartridges readily available. Not all new printers use new model cartridges so check before you buy! HP does not list the ml on the packaging, instead they say how many pages the cartridge will do. For example HP22 says 165 pages, which is 5ml of ink in each colour. The 165 pages is at 5% coverage which is not a lot and I think is very misleading.
HP also has a good range of laser printers, you can easily get genuine and remanufactured toners as well as parts if the printer breaks. All in all HP makes good printers but they can be expensive to run.

Good Luck Danny

2010-08-18T06:50:00.001-07:00

A self indulgent post to say good luck to Danny, he has set off on the adventure of a life time today. He is going to work in New Zealand for a year. He will be racing with a bit of showjumping as well. We are all rather jealous of the fact that he is jetting off to their summer! We are all missing you terribly, have the best time and make the most of the sunshine!

Epson Printers

2010-08-17T06:57:00.001-07:00

Epson are the most popular brand of printer for the domestic market and offer a wide range of attractively priced printers to suit most requirements. Most of the new printers take one range of cartridges. These mostly take four cartridges one black and one each of cyan, magenta and yellow. Brand new cheap alternative cartridges are available across the range with savings of up to 90% being achievable over genuine cartridges. The new cartridges have microchips on them which can cause recognition problems, do not buy the cheapest you can find, do not change all of your cartridges at once always change them one at a time, we are up to version 7 on the microchip on the most popular cartridges (Epson brings out a new version of microchip to keep in front of the alternative manufacturers) so purchase your cartridges from a trustworthy source or you might end up with the right cartridge but the wrong chip - useless!

Epson printers have fixed print heads that clog up over time causing banding (lines from left to right on your printout) and complete blocking. The only remedy is to do regular print head cleaning from new, don't wait until you have a problem. Using the compatible ink will shorten the life of your printer but by the time it happens you should have saved enough money to replace it several times over.

The modern Epson printers do not measure how much ink is in the cartridge they do a page count and estimate. The result is that even if you use genuine ink when the cartridge says it is empty there will still be ink in it, so you will be throwing it away. Once the counter has reached its maximum it will not print no matter what you do. This is more of an issue with compatible cartridges as they normally have considerably more ink in them than the genuine cartridges. The chip is tweaked so more pages are printed than with the genuine cartridge but ink will still be thrown away. Another alternative is to use cartridges which have a resetting chip there are a lot of cartridges around advertised as double capacity and they do have a double the ink compared to the genuine cartridge but again all you do is throw it away as the printer counts the pages not the ink in the cartridge. Epson are good printers until they go wrong, they can be expensive to fix once the print head is blocked, it's just the waste of ink when it is so expensive to buy in the first place that irritates me. I wouldn't go and buy something and only expect to use three quarters of it but thats what Epson want us to do.

A disclaimer!

2010-08-17T06:53:00.000-07:00

Before I go into all the details about the different make of printer I want to make completely clear that these are my own opinions.

Which printer to buy?

2010-08-16T05:51:00.000-07:00

Many of you are looking for a little guidance on which inkjet printer to buy. We have been selling ink cartridges for well over ten years to domestic and commercial customers throughout the UK and Europe and over that time we have picked up a little insight. We sell the manufacturers own brand of cartridge at the best prices you will find as well as the cheaper alternatives.
The most important thing to remember when buying a printer is - what is it going to cost me? No not the price of the printer the cost of the replacement ink, or if you like the what is it going to cost you per page to use. Quite often the cheapest printer to buy is the most expensive to actually use, sometimes one set of replacement inks cost more than you paid for the printer.

There are two main types of inkjet printer.

Multiple cartridge machines mostly take 4 cartridges one black and one each of cyan, magenta and yellow but can take many more.

1. The big advantage of this design over printers that take two cartridges (one black and one colour) is that in the two cartridge machines the colour cartridge is split into three compartments (cyan, magenta, yellow) and when one of these compartments is empty due to you printing a lot of one colour (lots of blue sky maybe) you have to throw away the other two compartments ink and all. If one ink has run out the printer will not print.

2. The cheaper alternative ink cartridges for these machines are brand new copies of the genuine article often for a fraction of the price.

3.The main disadvantage is that these machines have a print head inside the printer that clogs with dried ink over time. This happens with genuine ink as well as the cheaper alternative version. The only way to prevent this happening is to do regular print head cleaning from new, do not wait until you have a problem. Using the compatible ink will probably shorten the life of your printer but by the time it happens you should have saved enough money to replace it several times over. Remember to clean your print head!

Cartridge with Print head machines.

1. The advantage is that every time you replace your cartridge you replace the print head in your printer, theoretically leading to better print quality and longer printer life.

2. The disadvantage is that most of these are two cartridge machines - see above.

3. The cost of the replacement ink is high, as they include the print head.

4. The brand new compatible inks are not available for these machines. The alternative inks are genuine cartridges that are remanufactured. You can have your cartridge refilled in a shop literally with a syringe and needle, the other option is the professionally remanufactured version. These are recycled cartridges which are refilled in a factory. I will post a description of the process separately. Remanufactured cartridges are more expensive than brand new alternatives and a have a higher failure rate.

5. When a set of genuine replacement inks costs nearly as much as a new printer maybe extended printer life is not an advantage!

I will post a breakdown of the various printer brands so you can make an informed decision!

2010-08-16T03:09:00.001-07:00

Just about to add analysis of various printer brands to the blog, have a look!

Practice, practice, practice

2010-08-12T06:01:00.000-07:00

This is one of the pictures I have been practicing with in preparation of the NEXT BIG THING.... very soon all will be revealed! I took this picture on Christmas morning, its the view looking towards Cartmel from our house.

2010-08-12T03:04:00.001-07:00

Just waiting to hear news about the freebies!

Freebies, freebies!!!

2010-08-11T07:56:00.000-07:00

We have been in talks with one of our bigger suppliers about freebies for a couple of weeks now. I felt that it had gone a bit quiet so probably wasn't going to happen when all of a sudden we had a phone call saying get ready for delivery. From our conversations with them last week I was expecting a palette of various bits and bobs and now its sounds like a bit more than that.... last phone call was could we get an arctic near to the shop!!!!! Luckily we can so I am thinking you are all going to be deluged in freebies in the coming weeks! What a result!

Ben hard at work

2010-08-11T06:56:00.000-07:00

Ben is worth his weight in gold, he is doing the alterations in the shop, here he is making some new shelving units in the downstairs stock room (more of a holding area really, the main stock room is upstairs) The big change round will be happening soon, I will do some before and after pictures for that, I will let you into the big secret of what we will be doing soon!

And all the rest...

2010-08-11T03:22:00.000-07:00

I don't have a picture of me that is suitable (all with horses!) I will get one soon. There are a few other people in the background at work but I will leave them in the shadows for the moment!

Maggie

2010-08-11T03:16:00.000-07:00

Maggie works part time in the shop and has been with us for the last three years. She is normally in on the day I'm not so I don't see her as much as everyone else, but that means when I do see her there is lots of catching up to do! Loves going to the gym and long walks with her two little dogs.

Ben

2010-08-11T02:45:00.000-07:00

Ben works in the shop but also does a bit of everything as well. Today he is laying the new flooring in the new bit of the shop! Ben is a builder by trade which comes in very handy. When we moved shop last year he did all the fitting out in the new shop and did an amazing job. He is also building an extension at home so I think he comes to work for a rest. He is John's youngest son and a workaholic like his Dad! Ben is forever helping me and I am incredibly grateful!

Tommy

2010-08-11T02:29:00.000-07:00

Tommy is the original team member who was here before the rest of us. He came along with the company when we bought it and I can safely say we would be stuck without him. He is Packing Manager and keeps me right when I am packing with things like airmail and shipping to places like South Africa which I can never remember how to do. Also mends printer, computers, anything that won't work - he gets it going again. John tells Tommy and I off for chattering "in Scottish" Tommy also makes the best cup of tea! Don't play him at snooker you will lose!

Meet the team

2010-08-11T02:08:00.000-07:00

I thought you might like to meet the team. I will do a post for each member of staff starting with John the boss (better do him first!) So here he is actually looking a little tired in this picture, I didn't tell anyone I was going to take their picture so they weren't prepared. John does a bit of everything, when our website crashed in February he came into work at 5.30am and finished at 7pm almost every day for 7 weeks! He really is the driving force of the team and a real inspiration to us all......more about that another day. I should also add that he is my husband!

Some more (not so good) info on price rises.

2010-08-09T02:22:00.000-07:00

I just got some more details of the price rises we heard about last week. One of our suppliers sent us this....
Brand %Increase/Decrease Product Reason
HP 3.5% Increase Laser Supplies Exchange Variations

Lexmark Increase between 4% All (Laser and Exchange Variations
and 11.7% Ink Cartridges)

Sagemcom 10% Increase as of All (Laser and Exchange Variations
1st September Ink Cartridges)

Epson The following changes came into effect on 1st August
* Individual ink cartridges will increase by up to 3%
* Multipacks increase by up t0 15%
* Laser increase by up to 3%

Now doesn't that make for cheery reading? I think I am just the same as you in thinking I hate that the prices go up so much. We do try to absorb as many of the market fluctuations but it isn't always possible. We buy ink every day and there are minor prices changes every day. John does all the purchasing as he is a born haggler, even down to the last 2p! I sometimes feel like I have to leave the office as he wears down the opposition and plays seven different suppliers off against each other, he loves it!
On the plus side we are changing the shop around (Ben is multi tasking this week!), we have big changes in store, I will tell you more soon!

2010-08-02T06:39:00.001-07:00

HP inkjet prices went up last month by 9%, but we have held our prices! Just been told that Epson, Canon and HP (toners) are going up 3% this month, hoping to hold our prices - will be reviewing soon though!

2010-07-22T04:22:00.001-07:00

Think I have finally got my head round all this social networking so here goes for first post from Ping! Fingers toes and eyes all crossed for success!

2010-05-04T01:52:00.001-07:00

For orders over £20 Special Offer on Printer ink cartridges get free Optical Mouse - promo code SMOM or Photo Paper - promo code SMPP

2010-04-06T09:42:00.001-07:00

KC Inks supply Ink Cartridges & Toners for Schools, Colleges, Universities, NHS & Government Bodies http://ping.fm/4f2os