Discuss the various t-shirt fulfillment services in this general fulfillment forum. Newer companies like RedBubble, etc can be discussed in this main forum.
Companies that have been around 2+ years (CafePress.com, Zazzle.com, Spreadshirt.com, PrintMojo.com, PrintFection, etc), may have their own separate subforums below (as demand permits).
I'm seriously confused as to why the basic shirt costs for the POD sites are so high. I mean it seems that their business model is designed around selling one shirt to one person (i.e, I want to design a shirt for myself) rather than someone being able to sell shirts to the public.
Some POD sites have a basic black shirt price of $21.99! (and a 10"x10" design limitation). You can buy "all over print" tees online all day long for $24.00 to $30.00 from the most popular designers.
Maybe I'm missing something but:
Wholesale priced shirt=$2.00
POD service printing cost=$19.99?
Please someone, school me here. I just don't get it.
Last edited by robdeth; June 6th, 2009 at 01:35 PM.
Reason: incorrect price for the example site used..another POD site does charge $22.99 for a basic black shirt however
I haven't researched much into PoD sites, but most seem to have fairly top end websites which cost a pretty penny to maintain as well as host.
Part of the price is the fact that they're so big and well known. They're basically charging the customer for the advertising rather than the designer.
I'm also unsure if your pricing is based on buying the shirt with the design, or the base price, but if it's buying, the designer expects some profit too from these sites, thus they have to mark up whatever Zazzle or whoever charges.
Since a lot of these are designed to be one off types of things, they most likely utilize DTG and Dye Sublimation, both of which have a fairly expensive price tag on inks, especially on DTG for darks which requires a white underbase.
Now, some of these costs are offset because I'm sure they're getting better discounts for the bulk purchases they make, but part of wanting custom is higher price. If you think the price is too high and you're just getting t-shirts for a local event or something, by all means shop someone local to print the shirts for you, it'd make the small print shops like myself a lot happier as well. If you think you have a design idea to market locally and possibly globally, do the same, you'll get the design printed for much cheaper, but you'll have to up your selling/marketing game.
In my opinion and in closing: These sites are more or less built for mass marketing a design to millions of people. Eventually they may price themselves out of the market, but apparently the demand is still there.
Sry...$21.99...point still stands however. $22.00 (to me) is more like a retail price. I get the marketing advantages of using the popular POD sites, but even that, do a generic search for something at CP. You'll be bombarded with less than "quality" designs. I'm sure there's quality stuff on there, but will someone take the time to find it? So even the marketing advantage is questionable.
Last edited by robdeth; June 6th, 2009 at 01:09 PM.
Thanks for the explanation. The insane pricing structure for the popular POD sites are just frustrating as low run POD fits what I need, but I can't get away with charging over $25.00 a shirt to reap a $5.00 profit.
Wholesale priced shirt=$2.00
POD service printing cost=$19.99?
Please someone, school me here. I just don't get it.
The main missing point here is that the POD is not printing "wholesale", they are printing "on demand". That's without any investment, risk, or overhead for the person who wants to sell a t-shirt design.
So in that $21.99 includes not only the blank t-shirt. It also includes the printing, payment processing, hosting, customer service, employees, electricity, phone lines, marketing, etc, etc, etc.
There are people who are marking up products there above the base price and are still making money.
The people buying $30 all over prints aren't the same customers that buy the t-shirts from the sellers at cafepress. So they don't have to really worry about that market.
Why would someone pay that for a t-shirt? Because the seller is selling an original design that the customer wants and can't get anywhere else.
Sure, there are some lower quality designs in the marketplace, but there are also some top quality designs there. Not all sellers are in the marketplace. Some just drive their own traffic and sit back while cafepress/zazzle/spreadshirt'printfection/etc does all the order taking, printing and fulfillment.
So in that $21.99 includes not only the blank t-shirt. It also includes the printing, payment processing, hosting, customer service, employees, electricity, phone lines, marketing, etc, etc, etc.
Absolutely, I understand the operating costs associated with actually producing the shirt. The explanations are spot on from the shirt producers part of the business, but what about the designers?
No one is selling blank tees to end customers for $21.99. The design sells the shirt and if I can't get to a final retail price that falls within the market range of available "like" products using POD and still make a 3-5 dollar profit then I just don't see the point of using the POD service.
I guess what I'm asking is why is the designer the one cutting their profit margin in order to get the final shirt price to market average? Is there really $20.00 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit for the shirt producer per piece?
I mean...is this out of the realm of reality for POD:
I guess what I'm asking is why is the designer the one cutting their profit margin in order to get the final shirt price to market average? Is there really $20.00 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit for the shirt producer per piece?
That's just the nature of POD. Obviously, there are hundreds of thounsands who are just fine with this arrangement. Those that aren't have their own site.
I agree. There are plenty of people who are content with the pricing arrangement, but no one has really validated ( to me) the basic shirt costs of some of the top POD providers (which was the point of my original post). If the answer is "they're successful" then cool, I'll accept that. But I was hoping to get some insight from the printers perspective. Are their $22.00 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit built into that number? How does that break down...is it $7 cost/$15 profit?
The POD sites latest marketing would suggest that their trying to move their store sales (through design quality) to the forefront while still maintaining a one off, low run, specialized event, etc., option. I just don't see how that's feasible when they're basically charging a retail price to a potential designer, in effect crippling the whole effort.
Last edited by robdeth; June 8th, 2009 at 02:13 PM.
I guess what I'm asking is why is the designer the one cutting their profit margin in order to get the final shirt price to market average? Is there really $20.00 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit for the shirt producer per piece?
Because the POD is taking the majority of the risk (and costs) in a POD relationship.
If the designer wants to make more, they would just need to take on more of the risk to get t-shirts produced (get their own shopping cart, buy t-shirts printed in bulk, etc).
There's a tradeoff no matter which way you go. With a POD, you trade off decreased risk and investment for decreased profit.
Buy doing it all yourself, you trade off more control and profit for more risk and investment.
Quote:
I mean...is this out of the realm of reality for POD:
Probably so. Because not only does the POD have to cover its costs (which I mentioned above), but it also has to make a "profit" above those costs in order to stay in business for long.
Quote:
I guess what I'm asking is why is the designer the one cutting their profit margin in order to get the final shirt price to market average
Because the designer is the one taking the least amount of risk and putting in the least amount of investment in a POD type relationship.
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I just don't see the point of using the POD service.
One of the points would be to bring a lot of designs to market on a wide range of products with little to no investment, no inventory issues, no shopping cart/hosting/customer service to do. Every sale that comes in is pure profit. You can sell 1 t-shirt or 100 t-shirts in a day, and still go about your life without having to lift a finger to produce or ship those goods.
Again, the tradeoff to all that is that there is decreased control over quality, less control over pricing, etc.
Quote:
Are their $22.00 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit built into that number?
Without knowing the costs (overhead) for the large sites like CafePress/Zazzle/Printfection/Spreadshirt/etc, it's almost impossible to give you the breakdown you're looking for.
Each business has a different amount of overhead to run. Smaller POD companies may have a smaller amount of overhead, so they may be able to offer slightly lower base prices.
Are their $22.00 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit built into that number?
You can only define acceptable profit by what the market will tolerate. There are multiple companies in this market (meaning, no monopoly issues to contend with), and they are thriving. Therefore, by definition, the answer to your question must be "Yes, there are $22 worth of associated costs and acceptable profit built into that number."
I still question the risk as the primary justification of the basic shirt cost however. If no one buys the shirt...it isn't printed, thus drastically lowering the risk to the POD provider...right?
To me, the POD market seems wide open for someone willing to treat the users of their services as resellers rather than end customers.
I still question the risk as the primary justification of the basic shirt cost however. If no one buys the shirt...it isn't printed, thus drastically lowering the risk to the POD provider...right?
Nope, wrong.
Server costs. IT workers. Press workers. Printer maintenance. Janitors. Packing and shipping department. Management. Warehouse rental. Utilities. Equipment investment. Blank shirt storage. Ink. Heat presses. Money tied up in shirts. Shelving. Web designers. Graphic designers. Marketers. Google ads budget. Other advertising outlets. Mailers. Franking machines. Customer service operatives. Computers. Phone banks. Accountants. Payroll. Software. Software development. Complaints department. Product development. Training. aaaand so on.
In a word, overhead.
The risk isn't whether or not someone buys this specific design, the risk is whether or not someone buys any design.
These are huge operations, it costs thousands of dollars just to open their doors for each day.
Very interesting thread. Maybe the most interesting one i have ever read. Well done all! There seems to have been a huge growth in POD services in the last few years. What is the ideal situation for all parties concerned i wonder?
The cost of POD in general 
