How it feels to be a first time buyer, how to purchase a printer at Prusa3D and how to get tricked by your long time favorite 3D printer manufacturer .
First of all, I already own and use Prusa printers. They are my daily drivers, my workhorses basically. But since I bought them well used from strangers on the internet, I figured it’s time for my first time purchase of a brand new Prusa. The Core One L to be exact.
The process of getting all information about the printer it self is without any barriers. A lot of additional info is given within strategically placed links, leading to clearly structured knowledge articles. This process felt easy, transparent and informative.
Feeling like a well informed buyer now, I proceeded to load the CoreOne L into the shopping cart. I got asked for some extra features, like the advanced filtration system. Of course I want that, and so it got selected. 80€ added to the overall cost. A „health improving feature“ is absolutely worth it. Very smooth experience. All cost are displayed clearly and transparently. Or so I thought…
Lured into this deceitful feeling of security, I went ahead and checked out. Payment went seamlessly and all things around shipment, lead times and the order got listet well structured, and again, very transparently.
Now, completely sunken into the joyful thought of the delivery reaching my doorstep, I proceeded to browse Prusa3D for things to improve the printer in the future. Since the websites search and filter function makes it very easy to only show parts, fitting to a selected printer, I got served many nice parts for my future Core One L, to be equipped with. A High Temperature hot end. Very nice but unfortunately out of stock. A diamond back nozzle. Also very nice but unfortunately a little pricey right now. But then, I saw it!!!
I got scammed! The advanced filtration system, being sold separately. Sold for a price of 79,99€! My stomach sank to the floor. I got upsold. I got scammed, betrayed even. The convenience of just selecting the filtration during printer purchase, now costs me heavily. 1ct or 0,01€. How am I ever going to financially recover from this?!
But I see the pattern here. This was deliberate. It’s all in the statistics. Prusa revealed that roughly 350k Mk3 units got sold from 2018-2023. these are roughly 4,8k a month during production. I’d say that a flagship printer like the Core One L can be manufactured in similar numbers, but let’s stay a little conservative here. Let’s take 3k units per month. Also let’s assume that all of them are shipped (see high demand with lead times) and that 50% of buyers opt for the advanced filtration system. Since the Core One L got released in October 2025, this is is equal to 12000 units shipped with the 1ct upsale. By this genius move, Prusa funnels extra money directly into their pockets.
12000ct since October last year. These are 120€ in total or 15€ a month. I looked right through your ruse! I know exactly what this money is spend for. 15€ is exactly the amount one needs to spend for one „Ice Cream Monday“ in office. This also explains why customer support is not available for 20 minutes between 10:00 and 10:20 on every first Monday of any month! Coincidence?! I think NOT! Gotcha Prusa!
I’m so sorry for this „shitpost“, the thumbnail and also for wasting your time here. I just can’t wait for my printer to arrive and so I have to spend the time with such nonsense xD Hope you had at least a little chuckle here
I’d like to highlight though, how well the whole Prusa3D website is layed out. It is a very great user experience Imho. I’m very happy with all interactions I’ve got with Prusa in any form so far. The customer support is basically not comparable to any other company out there. Absolutely top notch. Wish others would be just a little like Prusa. In many regards that is. Really looking forward for the delivery to arrive. I am absolutely thrilled about getting this Printer.
…but seriously Prusa, where is my 1ct?
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