Hi, I知 Christina and I知 planning to open a direct to garment printing shop. I've been planning for about 1 year; I went to the ISS in long beach and decided to buy a Brother GT 540 but hesitated to buy it because of the new GT 782 coming out. I feel like I知 in step 1 again trying to figure out which printer to buy. I know the 540 has really good reviews but it does not print darks and I think this printer will became obsolete in 5 years. But the 782 is too new, much more expensive (high production), not so many good reviews and may need some adjustments before it becomes as good as the 540. Can someone in already in the printing industry please help me out? Should I buy the 540 and wait some years to buy the 782 or should I risk it and buy the 782 now and be the first in market to have this kind of technology?
Who told you the 782 doesn't have good reviews? It has no reviews except industry announcements. The only thing bad is the ink cost. I personally demoed it without any experience and ran it alone within 30 seconds. The 782 is essentially a double 541 trust me I seen it with my own eyes. Also I spoken personally with 2 owners who say it is working flawlessly for them. I understand there is not much vocalness about it here but Brother is riding on the respect of the 541.
Many other machines out might suit you but education is best for awareness. Try a smaller machine more affordable like Harry's or DTG, maybe they can fit your business model.
Many people don't know but the 782 has been in development behind the scenes since the day the 541 was launched. Unfortunately unless people see it for themselves they have tough time believing it. Good luck with what ever avenue you choose. Wish you the best.
I have a 541 and while I could upgrade to the newer machine I dont see the additional features and capablilities carrying the additional costs. we run about 600 prints a month on our 541 and a large portion of these are simple black on light color stock designs. The 541 is putting money in my pocket and that is good enough for me. The idea that it may be obsolete in five years is certainly valid but to be honest it is possible the 541, the 782 and the next generation machine we haven't seen yet could all be obsolete in that time frame.
Walk before you run! Start off with a 541 and then work the client base up to the point where it will fund a dark garment printer. Printing dark garments with White ink does come with more challenges than just printing CMYK ink. Build your business up is a better business plan in today's economy in my opinion.
Walk before you run! Start off with a 541 and then work the client base up to the point where it will fund a dark garment printer. Printing dark garments with White ink does come with more challenges than just printing CMYK ink. Build your business up is a better business plan in today's economy in my opinion.
Angie is that you? Heeey I remember your advice on purchasing a 541 and you helped me make one of the best purchases we could've made. Hope as is well.
95 percent of my clients are happy with white/grey shirts.
I educate clients about doing darks and why i don't do them and when they take that in, they are like oh screw light garment it is.
Doing daks in my opinion is just a big chemical bath that people wear, whether the yummie chemicals in pretreatment to zinc in white, the environmentalist green hippies will love you.
I mean how much more can you typically charge more for a dark than a white $6 or $8 bux than you gotta thing, triple ink cost, double garment cost and triple time frame to do it.
Also a lease payment almost quadruple of 541, which means you gotta make x amount more just to make it pay off for itself ; )
I aint an econimist but I can see that you gotta do alot more darks than lights to justify buying it just to please x amount of the Emo crowd that have to have there black shirts
We lost last month alone 600 dark prints simply because we couldn't do it. We convince customers all the time but anybodies business would grow substantially if they could do darks. Once people know your are unlimited with your capabilities they bite until you put a sour taste in their mouth.
Sorry but the truth...
Hi, I知 Christina and I知 planning to open a direct to garment printing shop. I've been planning for about 1 year; I went to the ISS in long beach and decided to buy a Brother GT 540 but hesitated to buy it because of the new GT 782 coming out. I feel like I知 in step 1 again trying to figure out which printer to buy. I know the 540 has really good reviews but it does not print darks and I think this printer will became obsolete in 5 years. But the 782 is too new, much more expensive (high production), not so many good reviews and may need some adjustments before it becomes as good as the 540. Can someone in already in the printing industry please help me out? Should I buy the 540 and wait some years to buy the 782 or should I risk it and buy the 782 now and be the first in market to have this kind of technology?
You have to remember that the 782 will never be the same as the 541 due to you are adding white ink to the mix. The only way it would work as well as the 541, is if you are printing only cmyk. When you start printing with white ink, you have added maintenance and pretreatment, which would be the same on any white printing printer. The white ink has titanium dioxide in it, which is a metal, hence more likely to clog your printheads
I have the HM1 and do print white, but you have to keep up with it well, or you will have problems. Then there is the whole pretreating process that is added to the mix. The cost for printing goes way up when you add those variables to the mix.
I agree with Mark, if I were to choose either the 541 or the 782, I myself would go with what has been proven on the market, the 541
I would wait a while before I would say the 782 is a good machine, as there is virtually no feed back at all on that machine yet to be able to say whether it is a reliable machine or not.
Hope this helps Looks like my opinion is similar to the others, maybe a little more detailed though haha.
__________________
Always do right; this will gratify some people and astonish the rest. ~~~Mark Twain BobbieLee www.brightlittlebeginnings.com
Sunnydays not all machines handle white ink the same regardless of the Titanium Oxide. Will they need maintenance of course but until you actually used 2 machines as different as the Brother and the HM-1 your not qualified to say that. Sorry, Meant no harm... I ran a epson converted machine and it was a not the most comfortable feeling with or with out white ink. Just sharing my opinion with my experience. I mean not to discredit any other machine as I admire them as well but if epson converted machines worked so great there would be a need for people to try to create machines from the ground up. Haven't you noticed the big thing is to create a epson machine as far away from its original form as possible. Anyhow I do not want to have my thread removed so I will get back on topic.
Dear Thread starter, printing all the machines do but you should make a list of what variables need to be addressed in order for you to be comfortable with buying a machine. And if it isn't a Brother thats ok. Be sure your happy and go makes some money my friend.
Thats ok It was only my opinion I myself have been very happy with my machine, and in no way was I discrediting any machine. I was merely stating that until a machine has gotten feedback, its really hard to have any opinion on it. I agree the brother 541 does have great feedback, but that does not mean the 782 will have that same feedback, since it is not using the exact same ink and process. Of course it could be the best machine in the world when all is said in done also
I also think that just because one epson based machine may not work so great, that all of them should be lumped into the same catagory. The differences made on each machine, will really determine how it prints. With my Hm1 I am on my 2nd printhead in over 2 years, which I think is great. I have seen some printers, where it seems that people are replacing heads at an alarming rate. So each machine no matter how they are built is really determined on the other factors added to it, that will make it a good machine or a bad machine. I guess my point was that I would wait to see if the things that brother has added to their new machine, has made a big difference or not in its reliability.
All of our opinions I think are important That is all they are here too, is opinions.
__________________
Always do right; this will gratify some people and astonish the rest. ~~~Mark Twain BobbieLee www.brightlittlebeginnings.com
if you can afford the costs of white ink (labor and material) then consider a white ink printer,
otherwise stick to CMYK solutions for lower per print costs until you are ready to tackle a second market with additional investment.
Dupont and Brother garment inks have very different cure times and color reproduction. The CMYK maintainance cycle cost is also different between Epson based printers and Brother printers. The next layer of cost arrives when you add white ink to either print engine in four parts: pretreatment, maintainance, additional print time and the white ink itself.
Once you know the labor costs and material costs, it should be fairly plain to see which machine would be a better fit for your existing business or business plan.
I agree with mark and some of the other members, Start small with the 541. There are a lot of other ways to print darks. Screenprinting, (if you don't do this find someone that will do contract printing for you hopefully local). Transfers, You will already have a heatpress to cure the 541 shirts, or use vinyl for the small dark orders. It takes a lot of shirts to pay for the 541 but it takes a whole lot more to pay for the 782. Look at all your options for printing darks...
Once you know the labor costs and material costs, it should be fairly plain to see which machine would be a better fit for your existing business or business plan.
Some further thought since the main question is should one purchase the 782 or the 541.
Again, if you do the math on the labor cost, the machine cost, the maintainance cost and the consumable cost, you can pretty much see which solution fits you.
Even if you have doubts about the truth a salesperson gives you on the consumable cost (ie the long standing discussion about how much does a 10 x 12 inch print really cost in CMYK and how much does it really cost with a white underbase) use those numbers and pad them with a "risk" percentage. After you have the final number based on the claims by the sales person, add on 10%, 50%, 200%, or whatever number you want to make sure you are comfortable padding your expectations.
After all the math is done, then look at the final numbers and see if buying a $55k machine is going to work for your market. Remember, there are 3 things the GT-782 does that the GT-541 cannot:
1. Print white ink,
2. Allows the 16 x 18 inch platen,
3. Allows you to preload the next garment on the second platen (translates to slightly more efficient printing).
You may be able to overcome the the preloading issue using 3rd party platens or even just outright buying a second GT-541 and save $15k instead of purchasing a GT-782.
The other two functions though are solely the domain of the GT-782. If any of those 3 abilities are worth the extra cost per print you will pay for the GT-782, again that should become pretty clear once you finish doing the math.
Hope this helps and good luck!
Last edited by raise; September 4th, 2009 at 11:43 AM.
To buy or not to buy 
Re: To buy or not to buy 
Hope as is well.
