Maryland Students provide a cheap and convenient alternative for refilling ink cartridges

For any student on campus in dire need of an ink refill for their printer, the solution is only a few steps away. Inkup, a business created by three University of Maryland students, started taking its first orders on Oct. 11.

All you have to do is go to their website at letsinkup.com. Begin your order there, and drop off your empty cartridge when someone comes by to pick it up.

Co-founders Jon Grunewald, Bill Ke and Sascha Miraj met during the two-week Jumpstart program run by the business school shortly before the fall semester began. The three have since then worked toward the launch day of Inkup.

Grunewald, a sophomore in the business school, merely wants to provide a more convenient and cheaper alternative to the regular hassle of buying a new cartridge at your local Best Buy.

Grunewald said getting to launch day has mainly consisted of putting out the small fires along the way. "Every time we have an idea of a way to develop the business, we tend to find that there's a funny little problem with it," he said.

Originally they had planned on having drop boxes at dorms for students to leave their empty cartridges, according to Ke. But because this was regarded as soliciting students, they had to find a workaround.

Instead, Ke said they should have an envelope service in place soon, which would allow students to leave their cartridges at the front desk for a later pick up.

Whatever they've done, they've done it right since their first week of business, a timeframe in which they received more than 20 orders, According to Ke.

"It's actually going really well," Miraj said, "We've gotten multiple orders every single day of this week." For Miraj, getting the word out was the biggest challenge. According to him, "Facebook has, by far, been our best promoter."

Grunewald thinks that in addition to Facebook, promotions and flyers, another tool – word of mouth – will be as effective.  He hopes that the majority of their promotion will simply come from the satisfaction of one customer being passed on to another.