I think I get it now. It's about how you view yourself, your business, and your priorities.
A "graphic artist" selling graphics skills and his ability to market others will sub out as much non-graphics work as possible, since that's not his area of expertise or interest. He's willing to pay the wholesaler for his expertise since he does not see doing that job himself as value-added. He tends to both charge more for his work and spend more for what he needs.
A "signmaker" focuses on materials and assembly as much as design, and does as much as he can himself to save money and maintain control. He will learn whatever he needs to in order to save money, since he tends to see himself as a manufacturer, not just an artist. Buy an inexpensive printer, learn to use and maintain it (why hand a wholesaler or tech all his profits?), and make it work for him. He focuses on keeping his prices and debt down and watching the bottom line.
Both models can work, obviously. Just because you are not willing to invest the time to make a starter printer work for you, doesn't mean that someone else shouldn't. The time we spend in our shop prepping files, outputting them to the right format, checking, sending to the wholesaler, going to pick up, etc could easily be spent setting them up and printing them ourselves.
Personally I hope he buys the printer, makes it work, and comes back with financial data showing it was a great decision. More professional constructive support and less sarcastic "I know best; you're an idiot" from the gallery would be nice, too.