I've been using printfection for about three months now. I am somewhat satisfied with their service but wish to survey the other print-on-demand companies and see if I could do better elsewhere. First, let me just apologize for this kind of thread. I'm sure there's others similar to this out there. You'll have to forgive me because I want the latest opinions on these companies (incase things have changed) and also because I want to bring up a series of specific concerns and see what people think.
So if anyone's willing to write some detailed advice, or share their experience, I promise I'll read every last word.
Most of my designs right now are rasterized png files (from .psd), so I'm interested in a company with impressive
DTG results. I'd also be moving up to vector graphics in the future so flex/flock support (or whatever it's called) would be a necessity.
What I like about printfection is the nice customization of storefront layouts they give you (which I think most companies offer, but just want to mention that incase some of these companies do not). I appreciate the large number of colors available for t-shirts (31 colors!) so I can handle a reduction in such variety but hopefully I won't be going with a company that only offers 5 colors. I'd consider that severely limiting to my brand, which is quite colorful.
Unfortunately, printfection seems a bit idiosyncratic so i have a long wish list to report. Keep these in mind when suggesting an alternative...
1. My sales are sluggish. I'm a professional graphic designer so I'm not selling amateur stuff that can be made in minutes (the stuff you typically find on cafepress, in my opinion). I know my marketing hasn't been ratcheted up anywhere near the level it needs to be at, so I take some responsibility for this. But, on the other hand, the PF marketplace seems rather drab. The designs I routinely see featured on their front pages look pretty boring. Their forums aren't so active at all. I dunno, I just get the feeling that they're not too motivated in promoting products. Even cafepress seems much better suited (btw, cafepress isn't an option for me for several reasons) to getting a community of people interested in new shirts and concepts.
2. the PF team is very slow at answering questions on their forums, and they ignore certain questions. I once requested they add some kind of custom coupon feature so shop owners could design their own coupon codes, and after two months no admin has even bothered to reply. Again, I sense some kind of enthusiasm gap.
3. I'd prefer some company that offers custom coupons or a quick way to create promotions, although this concern can't override more basic concerns (such as print quality, variety of shirt colors, etc.)
4. The width limit on a standard shirt at PF is pretty good, but the height limit is lacking! It cuts off at about halfway down the shirt. I already noticed from spreadshirt's site that the height limit is significantly better. Still, I'm open to another company offering even better dimensions.
5. You can print on the front and back of a shirt, but not on sleeves, or the edges of a shirt. It just seems limited. I'm not going to go nuts on really obscure placements or anything (most of my designs would still be front and center), but every now and then it's nice to have a design reach the collar, or appear on some part of the sleeve.
6. A major annoyance at PF is that they don't print white ink on a light-colored shirt. Here's an example: I wanted to have a bright yellow shirt with some white clouds on it. Should be simple, right? No, it isn't, since yellow is classified as one of their light-colored shirts, the clouds will come out gray or a shade of yellow or something weird. Of course I see the sense in not printing white on a WHITE shirt, but they should be able to print white on a light green shirt. This is actually severely limiting, and I've had to change around a number of designs. They don't really seem to address this problem either.
7. I'm interested in companies that give me the most control over my brand's shopping experience. So, in other words, if a company will let me add my logo to their final sales screen, or include a little card with my logo when they ship out a shirt, or any other nice little touches like that... I'm interested in those kinds of things. I don't like people browsing through my highly customized site and then coming to a sales screen which is plain white and says PRINTFECTION in large letters. It's jarring.
8. I read somewhere that some companies, if they sell your product through their marketplace instead of through your specific storefront, will give u a reduced comission or something like that. Is there any truth to this? I'd want to hopefully avoid these kinds of companies unless everything else I mentioned was taken care of. In that case, I might forgive this concern.
9. PF uses Gildan shirts. I'd prefer to use AA or something similar in name recognition. A brand that when customers see it, will be like "oh okay I like them"
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Whew, okay, so that's basically it. Let me recap: I like printfection, I really do, but they just aren't keeping up with my business model the way I'd like. A lot of it might not be their fault, but regardless of that I feel I need to consider the 5-10 other companies out there. I mentioned spreadshirt above. I've been to their site and they do seem to be a better choice for me, but A) there might be an even better company, B) There might be some policy thing they do which I'm not aware of, which I had taken for granted at PF, and I would like to learn about it before it's too late. Anyway, thanks to anyone who read this and thanks for any advice!
Help me transition from Printfection to _______. What's my best choice? 
