I am trying to figure out if I can realistically afford to get the equipment to do this stuff. I want to make edible photo cookies for her wedding favors. Has anybody used the Epson printer for this purpose before and do you feel like it works well. Also, $75 is listed here as the price for a batch of edible ink cartridges. That seems like a lot but I guess that depends on how far the cartridges go. I realize that what colors are dominate in the photo will have a lot to do with how far it goes, but I was wondering if it was something were I would need to get multiple cartridge sets to do a hundred 3 inch cookies.

Any feedback is appreciated!

Edit: here is the site where I found the info:

http://www.cake-decorating-supply.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWCATS&Category=46

Only you can know if you can afford something. If you can see yourself using it on other occasions then it might work out. I don't have one myself cuz i just go to my HEB grocery store and purchase the image for $6.00 and charge the customer $10.00 for it. They have a scanner so they can scan pictures and even do them on cupcake circles.

I have a Canon printer that I only se with edible cartridges. I love it. It really cuts back the time I spend decorating. But for me it's kindda cheap because I refill my cartridges and I do believe that epson cartridges can't be refilled because of the chip. I don't know. Maybe it's worth it for you beacuse you could be able to do very original and pretty wedding favors.

Solecito

Could you explain me how do you refill your catridges, please.
And what kind of canon do you have

I have a Canon 2114,a very, very old printer that uses 2 cartridges. You can not find one like this, even in canon.com. Kopykake sells a refilling kit, it's 4 botttles of edible ink (cyan, magenta, yellow and black) and they have a needle-kinda-thing screwable top that you insert in the cartridges. The new ones I have didn't have a small hole to insert the needle but my husband drilled one for me. The holes are on top of the cartridges and you are suppoused to turn the bottle to insert the needle into the hole and drip the ink. I hope this helps.

I just did my first edible image cake today. I paid 7.00 per sheet, until i see what kind of response i get, i am going to wait until it find out if it is worth it. you local grocery store should be able to make the sheets for you. STOP AND SHOP will not, if you have them near you.

I too got one done today at my grocery store , 8.00 here. I just charge them what it costs me, I know I should at least charge them for the gas to get there. Have fun!!

Ah, thank you for pointing out the refill kits! I didn't even notice that. :O

I emailed them to ask if the refill kits work for the Epson printers too by chance, even though they are listed under canon. Maybe I'll get lucky and the answer will be yes.

A couple of tips if you decide to go for it..

Price out the printer and supplies separately. I bought the same printer they use in their system, a set of icing sheets and a set of cartridges all for under $160. I love it and wouldn't be without it.

I had to hunt down the printer but finally found it online at Office Max online for $49, free shipping! It's refurbished, but works perfect. I talked to the people at kopycake and they said there was no problem using a refurbished printer.

Interestingly enough, they also said you could use a used printer, something I thought was a huge no-no. They said as long as you cleaned the printhead (on canons) or ran a couple of test pages through after installing the edible inks, it was fine.

Most importantly, don't be the doofus I was the first time you use the printer. I probably went through a third of my ink and two hours of my time trying to figure out why everything was coming out pink.

Solution? You have to remove the tabs from ALL the cartridges before you install them!!! I had missed taking it off the blue ink cartridge. Dumb me!!!

i have two canon ip3000s and and epson. personally...i would steer clear of the canon...both of mine are not working. i actually started having problems with them when they reached their warranty limit. i have had several problems with both. my epson is the best. i've had it for almost a year and i have not had one problem with it. i also have another epson that i don't use for edible stuff and i've had that one since 2000 with no problems whatsoever. some companies that do edible inks are not doing them for certain canons anymore. the supplies are costly, but i only use mine for very detailed images.

I recently bought my system and I LOVE it so far. I found a new printer from Staples in Canada for $98 - Canon IP4300 - the newest model. I then bought the 5 cartridge ink system from Kopykake and a package of mixed sizes for the icing sheets. It has saved me lots of time with decorating because I usually do FBCT for all my images but you can do anything with this system. I still charge $7 per image I put on the cake but it only costs me about $2.50. The clients love it because you can put any picture they want on it. I am making 2 cakes this weekend using the images and I will be doing custom cookies soon enough so I see it getting used lots.
P.S. I don't think the cartridges are too much money because I have a regular printer that costs me $80 every time I need to replace the black and color inks so it is about the same.