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General => General Discussion and ??? => Topic started by: sweetts on October 02, 2011, 07:31:08 PM
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I thought I would share my little story of today it was interesting.
I hooked up with a local football league (kids), the idea was to apply names and numbers on their already purchased tee shirts (from another printer) with the thought of securing the contract for next years apparel. We brought our cutter and heat press to their locations and set up shop so here is what I learned.
Names and numbers while you wait, BAD BUSINESS IDEA hard to pull off with two people.
Smith is four letters long and for 4 dollars I should some how make it be 2 inches tall and 14 inches wide( thats what the lady wanted) I gave her her money back so she would shut up and leave, a real B
When the customer complains before work has started or money was exchanged WALK AWAY, no, RUN AWAY.
The more options you give people, the less likely they will know what they want. The longer your day will be.
Doing work because someone said they will give you the "big" contract is BS, this lesson will be repeated till learned I guess, this is twice for me. We printed up 6 new designs for them and brought samples and took orders for the new shirts, I found out that unless the samples are somehow locked to something it appears they will just go away.
I thought it would go smooth but it was the toughest day I have ever had in this business. I now know why no one does things like this, its rough. In case you are wondering we pulled in about $500.00 for the day so we cleared about $200.00 which is the last lesson there is no need to print up a ton of flyers people dont take them so save the money and just xerox some papers your bottom line will look better. Thanks for listening one good thing is there are now 100 people that are aware of my little business. Baby steps
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On names and numbers. unless using die cut letters and numbers, for which you can charge by the piece , cad cut must either be a flat rate, for a set letter and number size, or a charge by area of film used (assuming weeding difficulty or ease is constant)
Most will also charge an application fee on customer supplied shirts, though I waive that on full team or league orders like this.
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I thought I would share my little story of today it was interesting.
I hooked up with a local football league (kids), the idea was to apply names and numbers on their already purchased tee shirts (from another printer) with the thought of securing the contract for next years apparel. We brought our cutter and heat press to their locations and set up shop so here is what I learned.
Names and numbers while you wait, BAD BUSINESS IDEA hard to pull off with two people.
Smith is four letters long and for 4 dollars I should some how make it be 2 inches tall and 14 inches wide( thats what the lady wanted) I gave her her money back so she would shut up and leave, a real B
When the customer complains before work has started or money was exchanged WALK AWAY, no, RUN AWAY.
The more options you give people, the less likely they will know what they want. The longer your day will be.
Doing work because someone said they will give you the "big" contract is BS, this lesson will be repeated till learned I guess, this is twice for me. We printed up 6 new designs for them and brought samples and took orders for the new shirts, I found out that unless the samples are somehow locked to something it appears they will just go away.
I thought it would go smooth but it was the toughest day I have ever had in this business. I now know why no one does things like this, its rough. In case you are wondering we pulled in about $500.00 for the day so we cleared about $200.00 which is the last lesson there is no need to print up a ton of flyers people dont take them so save the money and just xerox some papers your bottom line will look better. Thanks for listening one good thing is there are now 100 people that are aware of my little business. Baby steps
that sounds to me like you took the work one of my customers declined! He went through it few weeks back and declined this weekend's event. . .
pierre
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Frog, we charged per name and per number so the pricing worked out ok we figured per inch of vinyl in height it should yield about $400.00.
Pierre, I now understand why someone would decline that work LOL, it was for Willowick's league and I don't think I would do it again, maybe pre-orders but no onsite stuff for me anymore.
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I've been charging $7 for a 2" tall vinyl name.... if I can't get that it's not worth doing.
I'm just now finishing an order of 200 hoodies and about 150 of them have a namedrop.
I make more on the namedrop than the two color design print, but I'll have twice as much time into the names.
I do feel bad for the kid that pays $7 and wants just two letters for the namedrop..... but it's takes the same time to cut,weed and press 2 letters as 10 letters.
Unfortunately, the kid that doesn't put his name on the hoodie runs the risk of having it stolen by his classmates... so, $7 is insurance (and customization).
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We just order them done from Stahls. It's a lot faster and cheaper for us.
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Ditto on Stahls.
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When I have to do names and numbers I charge $4 a name (2.5 X 11) and $4 for up to 2 digit number. (one digit is $4 also) I get them from Transfer Express. They are plastisol so the colors match and they look like they were screen printed. It sucks to do them and if you mess up a name you have to reorder so it sets you back 3 days. I don’t even offer it anymore unless it is a old client.
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Stahls as well....
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Stahls here as well.
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I debated Stahls with my buddy the other day... I just rather do cut vinyl... seems easier/cheaper. You just have to stock some vinyl... but I can do it quickly and don't have to wait for mess ups.
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I have someone else do it.
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Another one not to do is give a customer a catalog from a supplier and let them go wild.
I cannot get our sales people to stop. They will invariably order goods that are out of stock,
closeout discontinued, etc.
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Gilligan, what is your cost per sq. foot on shirt vinyl? And how long does it take you to weed them? I found that it's faster and thus cheaper to go the stahls route.
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I debated Stahls with my buddy the other day... I just rather do cut vinyl... seems easier/cheaper. You just have to stock some vinyl... but I can do it quickly and don't have to wait for mess ups.
Cheaper? No way. Those Stahls transfers are dirt cheap, but I'm with you on easier. I do cut vinyl also and haven't tried the transfers yet. But I did a booster club order of over 200 tees with name and number on the back. Once you order your second roll of $300 vinyl you start to wonder, "am I making any money on this order?" lol wish I would have done transfers. But then again I can't match the font that's on the front print with transfers.
When you order the stahls letters and enter in all the team name/numbers, they don't pre-lay each player's letters and numbers out for you on one sheet somehow do they? THAT would be awesome to get a stack of transfers in the mail all ready to go in the order you entered them. But I figure they send you stack of letters and numbers and you sort it out?
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Hmm, actually you can have it done either way. You can have the name placed ABOVE the correct number so all you do it apply that. Generally, I get the names cut and layout my own numbers. That is cheaper.
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Gilligan, what is your cost per sq. foot on shirt vinyl? And how long does it take you to weed them? I found that it's faster and thus cheaper to go the stahls route.
You guys are right... it's not cheaper (I don't think)... I misspoke. It is more flexible and kind of makes it cheaper if you want to be flexible... like having multiple colors/fonts. That would get super expensive with Stahls where as I can cut whatever I want in any color I have.
I order a 15" roll at $2.18 a linear foot or less (depending how much I order)... that works out to $1.75/square foot? We do take the time to utilize the space as much as possible feasible. Name and number we will cut in one sheet for ease of placement... BUT if it's a long name and a single number we will gang up other stuff in the dead space. We recently did 9 shirts and I put the sponsors on the sleeve and cut them out of "dead" space around a couple of numbers. You can quickly reduce your cost that way but it is a little more work, but not bad.
My wife would kill me if I was doing name drops with individual letters... then again, I guess you rig up a jig and use application tape... she still wouldn't like it.
Weeding t-shirt vinyl is easy on the hands... just tough on my cheapskate wallet (knowing I'm throwing away perfectly good vinyl LOL )
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Gilligan, what is your cost per sq. foot on shirt vinyl? And how long does it take you to weed them? I found that it's faster and thus cheaper to go the stahls route.
You guys are right... it's not cheaper (I don't think)... I misspoke. It is more flexible and kind of makes it cheaper if you want to be flexible... like having multiple colors/fonts. That would get super expensive with Stahls where as I can cut whatever I want in any color I have.
I order a 15" roll at $2.18 a linear foot or less (depending how much I order)... that works out to $1.75/square foot? We do take the time to utilize the space as much as possible feasible. Name and number we will cut in one sheet for ease of placement... BUT if it's a long name and a single number we will gang up other stuff in the dead space. We recently did 9 shirts and I put the sponsors on the sleeve and cut them out of "dead" space around a couple of numbers. You can quickly reduce your cost that way but it is a little more work, but not bad.
My wife would kill me if I was doing name drops with individual letters... then again, I guess you rig up a jig and use application tape... she still wouldn't like it.
Weeding t-shirt vinyl is easy on the hands... just tough on my cheapskate wallet (knowing I'm throwing away perfectly good vinyl LOL )
Agreed. I like the flexibility of vinyl for small orders and simple low quantity joke/bday/bachelor party shirts. If I do this 200+ piece order again next year though I may price the transfers already set up per person to save a little bit of sanity. It does seem like such a waste throwing away all the negative vinyl haha I sometimes stop and think about it.
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Yeah, at 200 pcs... either I'm hiring a goon to weed all that or I'm looking for alternative means.
Either way you are "hiring" someone to do it. Sometimes I'd rather just give my daughter a little more money... at least make her work for it a little. :)
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Stahls was not an option Sunday, we did them as the people came in and had no idea who or how many people would be there. It was not ideal but I am glade I did it, now I know. Stahls is nice to use saves time and I like the back to look printed the same as the front instead of printed on front and then vinyl on the back. I dont think the customer really cares much but I do, plus they are right down the road so I can get next day service and no shipping. I use the vinyl mostly for those 1-10 shirt orders.