Discuss the CafePress service and features. Please note: this is not an "official" CafePress sponsored forum, it is a peer to peer community for current and future CafePress members. Visit CafePress.
I've been in this industry for over 25 years, so I am keenly aware of product and
production costs. I have been looking into CafePress (or open to something similar) as a means to set someone else up with a side business to generate a little extra income for them. To my point/questions:
Looking at the cost prices on many (if not most) of the products offered by CafePress worries me that this may not be a viable venture. As an example,
I saw mugs in the $10-$11 cost range. I personally wouldn't pay more than $5
for a mug. How does (can one) sell a mug for (example) $15? I certainly know
the cost of a t-shirt and how much the machines, labor and consumibles cost
to print them. I don't so much begrudge what these companies feel they need
to charge in order to return a profit. I'm more concerned that the markups on these costs (even if minimal) would price many items out of the market or at minimum cause low sales.
Has anyone found resistance to the high prices that these products require?
Does anyone with CafePress (or similar) experience have any input regarding these concerns that they can offer?
I agree with you completely. I set up a shop and ordered one of my designs on a dark t to see what the quality is of their printing and shirts. It nearly killed me to pay $25.99 for a 5.6 oz gildan t with my design and shipping costs. But, I did it for quality control reasons and to see their product first hand.
Yes their prices are definitely a little higher than the sellers would like them to be but don't forget that they pay for the shirts, shipping of the shirts to them, the machine that they print with, utilities, personnel, ink, curing, rent, ecommerce, poly bags for shipping, and anything else I've forgotten, so they're not making as much profit as it seems.
As far as whether or not people will pay that, yes, they will. If you have good designs that appeal to them and they find a design on your site that they really want, then they'll pay the $18.99, plus your markup, we'll say $5 and another $5-$7 for shipping. That's a minimum of around $28.99 for a 5.6 oz cotton t-shirt. Cafepress has stories that say that they have several designers making over $100,000 per year and they wouldn't be able to if people weren't willing to pay the price.
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Hard labor kills, make t-shirts instead.
I think the biggest success of CafePress is the niche. They sell a lot of things on there you can't get anywhere else. So people will pay. Also you have to factor in the idea that having a shop there is also helping get business to your front door. The only down to that, that I have found is when I am trying to look for something, I get lost in the thousands of designs that are there.
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The original Thread Killah!™ Heavy Metal Art and more @ www.deathisgain.com
Brian,
I guess it depends on your target market. My mugs and mousepads are a flat $15. Tshirts are $25 for cotton and $35 for dye sub. Artwork charge is included in that price and is a bargain since every shirt is a custom job(usually a photo or idea someone has). I guess if you are doing standard designs, you could charge less, but that defeats the purpose of why I added this to the business. It's all in perceived value, not real value. People will pay to be different and have a truly personalized item.
Brian,
I guess it depends on your target market. My mugs and mousepads are a flat $15. Tshirts are $25 for cotton and $35 for dye sub. Artwork charge is included in that price and is a bargain since every shirt is a custom job(usually a photo or idea someone has). I guess if you are doing standard designs, you could charge less, but that defeats the purpose of why I added this to the business. It's all in perceived value, not real value. People will pay to be different and have a truly personalized item.
Jim
Embellishments in Thread
I agree. A lot of new shopkeepers on Cafepress (including me) started out only marking their stuff up a dollar or two. But the general consensus is that if people were just looking for a t-shirt, they could walk into Wal-mart and buy one for $5.00. But on Cafepress, people are paying for the design, something unique that you can't find in a Wal-mart. I now mark all of my shirts up $8-$12. I saw this statement once made to a new shopkeeper questioning the logic of a high markup, "Would you rather sell 20 shirts and make $20.00, or sell 5 shirts and make $40.00?"
When I started my shop at Cafe Press- I couldn't believe the prices and felt bad when I had only marked my stuff up $1-$2. I wouldn't pay that much money for some of the items. But as it was told to me- don't think of what YOU would pay for it. Mark it up and watch the things sell. To be honest, I started selling more items when I marked my prices up. Don't know why- but it worked out that way. And I still am no where near the prices some of the other SK are. People will buy the itmes- even $15 for a mug....I have sold several.
offer my thanks to all who have responded. I'm planning on helping her
proceed with this and will give feedback as I have a chance. I also hope
to be able to offer up any advice that I can in the future.
I certainly know the cost of a t-shirt and how much the machines, labor and consumibles cost to print them.
You and I know that....but the average consumer doesn't know that. They only know that they like the item enough to spend the money.
I make, IMO, a reasonable profit on items in my shop. Especially considering that I really have to do nothing except post the items. I'm not getting rich, but I get a check every month from CP. If I spent more time promoting and enhancing my site (and less time here, ), I think I could make even more.
So the short answer is, yes, people will buy things at CP prices.
Hope your friend has lots of success.
Ken
__________________ 350tees.com Talk Is Cheap, Especially On Our Shirts
Hi,
Just wanted to add that I was afraid to put a greater than $2 markup when I was just starting out, seeing that the bases prices were high enough already. When sales poured in, I gradually increased my markups to $4 and finally to premium pricing (about $5-$8 on a variety of products) and let me assure you that people have not stopped buying the shirts even with the higher markups. In fact I learned that some of the top selling stores in Cafepress have markups as high as $10-15 and they still manage to sell at least a dozen products everyday. (Of course they also make sure that their designs are worth the extra money).
Just do the basic math. If you are selling a product for $1 with a 50c cost you need to sell 200 to make $100. If you up the price to $2 you only need to sell 67 to make that same $100 profit. You do it by selling 2/3 less product. So you can cut your volume by a substantial amount and still make the same amount.
Put it to a very large customer base via the web and you are looking at a good opportunity to make some money no matter what the price.
funny, I was actually really into cafepress until I saw the price of the mugs.
I hear they are great quality, and I love mugs as much as the next guy, but $11+? It sort of turned me off from the whole thing.
We see dye subbed mugs at shows for $11.95 + sales tax. We sell ours for $8 including tax and volume orders get them for $6 plus tax. I am sure we could sell them at shows for $12-$15 especially if we brought our press and did custom mugs.
Yeah, I used to mark up my products measly amounts. But then last December I just raised the prices in my shop to see if it would hurt the sales. But it didn't, so I left it. I think a higher price increases the perceived value of your product, and customers wont hesitate the spend more for quality items.
Someone actually bought a tote bag for $40. Thats a $27 markup. So yeah, customers are definitely willing to pay up for the products they want.
But I have reduced the prices a bit again. To see if this will have any affect on sales. So far its been the same, but I'm gonna give it some time to see what happens. I'm still trying to find the sweet spot to maximize the sales.
Pricing concerns... 
Heavy Metal Art and more @ 
), I think I could make even more. 
