TSB
screen printing => Equipment => Topic started by: pwalsh on September 19, 2016, 01:18:43 PM
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There are two types of customers that have traditionally driven garment screen-printers nuts. The first is the guy who has a clothing design that’s going to sell thousands of units, but right now he just needs 6 to 8 of each design to get started. Then there’s the other guy who reaches out on Tuesday afternoon needing to have 25 to 30 shirts with a full color image designed, printed and shipped in time for the event that he’s having on Saturday. Many of the garment decorators I’ve known over the years refer to customers with these types of service expectations as being unrealistic, and/or that they were just being a pain in the…….. Back in July our favorite amphibian Andy posted a question on the TSB forums asking if other garment decorators were seeing an increase in the number of requests from customers for extremely short lead times, even same day service.
I’ve been giving this issue some thought and wanted to reach out to the TSB community with a short survey to identify any trends on how customer expectations for lead times and minimum order quantities have changed in our industry. I’d ask any garment decorators who are interested in this subject to complete the attached survey, and email it back to me at peter.walsh@mrprint.com. I’ll tally up the responses that I receive from TSB, and a few other sources and provide a summary report to everyone who completes the survey. Finally, as a show of appreciation to the garment decorating community for participating in this program we will enter all names into a drawing to receive a $250 Credit for purchases from the M&R Online Store.
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i plan on filling this out tonight, but it seems our orders here keep getting bigger and have tighter and tighter deadlines.
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Well Peter, if I may as be so bold to suggest that part of this falls right into a good selling point for DTG printers. It's certainly one of the major influences on the seemingly increased expectations for smaller, quicker screenprinted jobs which otherwise would fall in their purview.
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We also have seasonal work and it's impossible keeping all the staff in the slack periods.
We have a core of employees who know the work and bring in students and part timers when we are busy.
I always thought that getting workers in the USA was not a problem, who is going to work in the industries that Mr Trump wants to bring back to the USA?
Israel used to have a big textile industry, today everything textile is imported, our caregivers are from the Philippines and our agricultural workers from Thailand. We have Chinese and Romanian builders.
There are certain jobs that no locals want to do for any wage and when they do work they are lousy workers.
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Imo... it begins with a sense of entitlement. "Grow up to be anything you want to be" No one wants to grow up to push a broom....
My kids are at a school where part of their yearly curriculum is to be in an apprenticeship. On top of getting a good education, they are required 2 days a week to go to their apprenticeship - Learn and Work - and then write about what they have learned at the end of each semester. They give a 30 minute presentation to their class and everyone learns...
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i plan on filling this out tonight, but it seems our orders here keep getting bigger and have tighter and tighter deadlines.
Exactly.
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i plan on filling this out tonight, but it seems our orders here keep getting bigger and have tighter and tighter deadlines.
Exactly.
20 years ago it was 10,000 pieces one design, print it, box it, out the door.
today it's still 10,000 pieces but 30 designs and they've got bag and Fold, hangtags and packing and color changes in pre-packing has to ship out to multiple locations and it's all due the same day.
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We deal with both type of clients. I prefer though the guys who need shirts within a short period of time over the folks who dream of selling 1000s of pcs.
For rush orders we charge accordingly so it does not hurt us at all. While dreamers who in the end order only 10 pcs do feel like time wasters especially if you have to spend several hours holding their hands during the order process.
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As possibly one of the few real flying solo printers in this group I hope the other smaller shops / guys & gals add their info for Pat and all of us ...jump in
mooseman
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I have older established marketing companies that on a weekly basis are apologizing for rushes , they remember the days of 2 week + lead times and are having as hard a time dealing with rushes as we are
not much you can do but charge for it that doesn't really seem to matter as much, they want it now and usually will pay
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Although it's irritating, we never charge rush fees. We are known in our area as the shop that can getter done. In 10 years, we've had 1 instance where we couldn't and it was because the guy comes in on a Friday and wants 1000 or so shirts by Saturday and there was no way to get them in time. I would charge a rush fee if it were a rush and the customer was an ahole though.
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Although it's irritating, we never charge rush fees. We are known in our area as the shop that can getter done. In 10 years, we've had 1 instance where we couldn't and it was because the guy comes in on a Friday and wants 1000 or so shirts by Saturday and there was no way to get them in time. I would charge a rush fee if it were a rush and the customer was an ahole though.
We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
But we charge rush fees. Don't sell yourself short. People understand the need for rush fees, you can still be known for getting it done even if you "have to" charge rush fees.
We just tell them that we have to stay late to catch up on what we pushed back for their order to keep up with our schedule. Hardly is that ever true, but most people understand. Typically where we charge a rush fee, no other shop in town is going to get it done anyway.
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The only thing that saves us is that we are typically higher in price than most. Maybe I do need to add a little extra because it is becoming a norm of last minute. More often than not, we do have to work after hours to make it happen.
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
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We do both types as well, we are a contract and a retail shop. If we can get it out for them, we'll take it, with rush charges of course. Why would we work extra hours for less pay? Charge for the rush. While I won't suggest that they f'd up, I will tell them that they could have planned better...
Steve
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
I side with this, + what Sbrem said. I'll work doubles to get things out on time - but rush orders need rush charges, because it is more work, and it's a pain to everyone who has to shift schedules (business or personal). Not charging for extra work done is right up there with the newbie who undercuts everyone else, without realizing that he's not making money - just making everyone else look expensive. (I was that newbie, but I finally learned to do math.)
So, yes, smash it out. But I encourage you to charge what it's worth. They'll still be impressed, even if they pay for it. (I'd even argue this reminds them they've gotten something of value, & won't take it for granted.) And it will also help most of them to at least try to give you a little more lead time next time. That's what we get - both the "wow, thanks" and the attempt not to have to pay the rush fee next time.
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We do rush work each week, but you can't pay me extra to put off regular jobs and frankly unless its a big order or big customer we aren't going to work nights or weekends just to accommodate poor planning for a random customer. We honestly tell them our production estimate and if it fits we do it, if not we don't.
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
If they are willing to pay for it, I will pick up their dry cleaning. I mean, I don't see how it's bad for our industry to say "yes, we do X for you, but you will have to pay a pretty price for that type of service." I don't see how saying "no" helps, especially when someone else will likely do it without even charging a rush fee.
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Our turn times range from 1 day to 2 weeks depending on a number of factors. We don't work OT, we just get it done fast and out the door, no sense having stuff sit around for a week if your workflow is set up to move fast.
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
If they are willing to pay for it, I will pick up their dry cleaning. I mean, I don't see how it's bad for our industry to say "yes, we do X for you, but you will have to pay a pretty price for that type of service." I don't see how saying "no" helps, especially when someone else will likely do it without even charging a rush fee.
I'm right there with you, we also do rush orders from time to time. The problem, with me, is when you do one of those jobs because you actually have the time (low season or you have a slot) and the customer starts to expect you to do them all the time as a rush order. It's just not sustainable in the long run and will bring more harm than good. I'm sure all these kids that need stuff printed in 2 days (or less) already had someone work OT for them in the past and they've come to expect it.
Part of our job is to educate the customer, I think.
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
If they are willing to pay for it, I will pick up their dry cleaning. I mean, I don't see how it's bad for our industry to say "yes, we do X for you, but you will have to pay a pretty price for that type of service." I don't see how saying "no" helps, especially when someone else will likely do it without even charging a rush fee.
I'm right there with you, we also do rush orders from time to time. The problem, with me, is when you do one of those jobs because you actually have the time (low season or you have a slot) and the customer starts to expect you to do them all the time as a rush order. It's just not sustainable in the long run and will bring more harm than good. I'm sure all these kids that need stuff printed in 2 days (or less) already had someone work OT for them in the past and they've come to expect it.
Part of our job is to educate the customer, I think.
But they have to pay for it. We charge 50% to 100% more for rush jobs. So that order went significantly up... we definitely inform them of WHY it was so expensive and if they would have gotten it to us sooner it would have been X price.
If Mr. I Want It Now is willing to pay for it, then why do I care if he "expects" that sort of service. Sure, he does... but he also expects to pay for it. I'm good with that. Those extra dollars go straight to the bottom line!
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Tough for me to accurately participate in the poll as I do lots of fast turnaround multi color small runs, but do them as digital transfers.
However, since I began I have served the rush niche for screen printing with a fairly simple formula. Normal turnaround is ten days. Each day off of that adds 10% to the labor portion of the bill.
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We turned around a job (semi-rush, normal is a week this was less than) with no fees a while back... bachelorette shirts. She also added to the order 3 days before due date. We were dragging our feet in ordering (that's another issue) and then it had to come from a warehouse that was too far away to make it in time. We let her know, she wasn't happy... in fact she was nasty about it. She agreed to 10% off and she would have someone get them the next day. Then UPS decides to screw us. Normal drop off is 9-11 (latest)... here we are after lunch still wondering. Calling, run around.... we were getting blasted by this lady.
Finally, I had enough and I called her and told her, (paraphrasing) we are doing what we can, I'm sorry, if you would have called anyone else they would have not even done the job for you because no one can turn around this job this fast like we can. Next time we talked she had a COMPLETELY different attitude and apologized for being so nasty with us. I sympathized with her situation (maid of honor duties), we laughed, we satisfied.
She went from screaming about never doing business with us again, to laughing with me and being satisfied due to a little understanding put on her.
Maybe she will never come back... but honestly, we don't care. She was a B!tch! I'm just glad I squashed the potential negative review and kept her from making my front desk girl cry. :)
Also, lessened learned was that we should have told her about the rush fee and then waived it, vs just letting it slide. That removed that angle of leverage because she didn't realize she was already getting special treatment.
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
How so?
There are shops out there that work 24/7 in shifts to get their regular workload done. So why should another shop that does work only 8am-6pm not been allowed to stay open an additional 2 hours to get a rush job out of the door just because it might hurt someone else`s feelings and business.
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We kind of pride ourselves on this same thing... we've had plenty of people come to us and say "you guys smashed it with a short deadline last time, so I'm coming back (usually with a similar short deadline).
IMO this is what makes people expect everyone will work late hours for them. In the long term this will not be a good business plan for the entire industry.
How so?
There are shops out there that work 24/7 in shifts to get their regular workload done. So why should another shop that does work only 8am-6pm not been allowed to stay open an additional 2 hours to get a rush job out of the door just because it might hurt someone else`s feelings and business.
The point is the custy gets this kind of service, the over and above type, and then wants the same thing next time.. this custy now how a mindset that they can get their orders like this all the time. They use another company and walk in tue morning and expect to get their hand held for a friday order and lose their minds when they are told it will take 2-3 week before they get their order.. but but but.. that guy did the same thing for me in 3 days last time...
It's part of the want it right now consumer mentality we're in.
It's wed.. how many got a phone call today in the afternoon for a custy who needs something for a friday afternoon event..
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We probably got a few... they probably got quoted a rush fee of 50% more than standard.
If you want a cheap steak and mediocre service you can go to Waffle House... OR you can go to a nice Steak House and get a MUCH better steak and better service. You will pay a good bit more for it. That doesn't mean if you dine at a steak house every night that you will expect the same food and service from a Waffle House.
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That doesn't mean if you dine at a steak house every night that you will expect the same food and service from a Waffle House.
Of course you do. Not right away, but you will eventually come to expect it. You will always compare the quality (service) to that one steak you had earlier (to the turnaround time provided to you before).
I've seen this over and over again. One thing I've never seen is that rush customer come in earlier next time. They're always sorry and something always happens (the most used excuse for us is the designer). Do you know why? Because you accepted the order last time. And if you can't do it now, they'll go somewhere else and that person has to deal with a rush order.
Maybe we have different experiences but we (the industry) keep complaining everything's last minute when it's our own fault. It didn't happen today, nor last week. It's been happening for years. I'm part of the problem and so are you, because we also need those jobs to make ends meet or because we actually have an empty slot (or maybe we don't but keep pushing for it to get done).
This mentality needs to come from somewhere. It's usually from previous experiences.
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I do have expensive taste when it comes to steaks. That just means, I don't order the steak at shitty places.
To me it comes down to, if someone is willing to pay for it.
I mean, you gonna tell me you wouldn't print someone shirts with a 2 day turn around if they were willing to pay you 3 or 4 times your normal price? What about 10 times?
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A few points, we have a lot of orders that we deliver the same day. Mainly in the summer we work with youth groups that visit Isabel for 10-20 days and make a personalized shirt before they leave.
They do a drawing, send it to us using Camscanner, a great free app and we enlarge, sometimes clean up a little and print. We can get up to 20 of these in a day. We have driver who delivers in the evening and if they order before noon we can deliver the same day. Each order is about 45 shirts.
I came to silkscreening from photography, we used to have labs printing customers films, remember the Kodak instamatic. To process in 24 hours was amazing, we usually took a few days.
The Japanese took the same process and turned it into a one hour delivery, same chemicals etc. Just thinking out of the box.
If I could deliver everything same day I would, its a great way to get more orders. Today with computers making graphics easier, CTS speeding up screen preparation, we need to work out how to deliver faster.
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I have several suppliers that tell me they make more money on overtime than regular time....Their fixed overhead is amortized over a 40 hour week, so when they get in OT the only extra cost is labour.....The employees seem to be more productive in OT and love the extra bumps in pay every so often....The extra cost of OT labour is less than the savings from no overhead....
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And we rarely actually have to go into overtime.
That's just my excuse to justify charging them more.
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The point is the custy gets this kind of service, the over and above type, and then wants the same thing next time.. this custy now how a mindset that they can get their orders like this all the time. They use another company and walk in tue morning and expect to get their hand held for a friday order and lose their minds when they are told it will take 2-3 week before they get their order.. but but but.. that guy did the same thing for me in 3 days last time...
It's part of the want it right now consumer mentality we're in.
It's wed.. how many got a phone call today in the afternoon for a custy who needs something for a friday afternoon event..
Exactly why so many of our customers never go anywhere else, particularly the wineries for drinkware. We're good, priced right and faster than anyone is able to be so far. Our turn is often a day or two. Sometimes I lament that they expect so much, but if they expect that and every other competitor tells them they're crazy, so much the better for us.
Fast turns are now an effective barrier to entrance for our competitors.
:)
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Touching on minimums too.
When we get asked what is the minimum order for "x" our answer is invariable "1 pc." then we go on to explain that because of set-ups etc. 1 piece is often the same price as 12pcs. or more (first column for pad printing drinkware is a lot charge for 1-60pcs. you pay the same for 1 as for printing 60pcs.) I'd sayorder conversion to the higher quantity is around 75% as people see the value in getting more, and understand why it's priced like that.
Much better than just saying the minimum is 60pcs. and even if they do only order 1 pc. we make good money on it, so why say "no"?
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That's pretty much how I work as well. Setup charges are setup charges for me, and I dont care if they print one or 1000, I am going to make that money. Just now I had a woman pay me $135 for 4 shirts and the job took me about 4 minutes of printing, and with emails and setup time I spent about 25 minutes on the job. For me, that is great and I would do that all day...
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That's an interesting way of looking at overtime.
I keep trying to get more efficient so we don't need overtime, sometimes there is no choice.
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that's how OT should work.. it's gravy on that heaping plate of steak and taters you got from todays work.
way more shops go into OT just to get today's work done and or fix a mistake from that day, and that just eats at the bottom line.