[bigduke1022]

Do you charge a rush fee if somebody "needs" an order quick? If so, what do you charge?

 

[BnC Custom Ink]

Yes you should charge a fee if a customer wants it sooner than your stated time frame. I offer turnaround in 7-10 business days, if they need it sooner than they must pay.

I know I will get a lot of flak for this, but here goes....
I charge what I can get away with. I take into consideration the factors involved: how busy am I really? How profitable is the job? Will this lead to more sales from this customer?

This has only happens twice for me(so far) the first time I gave a $25 fee to my biggest customer, the second I shot for the stars, I didn't want the job as sin kid wanted 5 shirts with 4colors in 2 locations in two days. Forget that...

 

[nypdofficer1]

That all depends on you. How soon does the customer need the order? Will working on their order place other jobs on the back burner for you? If so, then i would charge them extra. But one thing to consider is whether they are a repeat customer, if so then that would determine how much or how little I would charge extra for the rush order. If you're not busy with other orders, you can make them believe you are and because you truly value them you will do it. When a customer believes they are getting amazing service, it earns you their loyalty for years to come. I hope this helps and not confuse you any further. I feel like my thoughts were scattered lol.

 

[Fenrir]

The other side of this would be if you do it once, they might always expect you to be able to do it, even if you get busy and have 20 other customers breathing down your neck to get things done on "regular time".

 

[Decal_Designs]

That is correct Fenrir, once you let them do a rush job for no extra fee, that will be their normal procedure. Always charge everybody a rush charge if it needs to be done in under X amount of days. If you decide 5 days is your policy, stick with it. Let them know about it right from the start of discussion. If they are 30 ahead of due date, mention it. Then they won't take the usual 26 days to think about it and expect you to finish in 4 days. My minimum rush charge is the next lowest quantity pricing.

 

[Unik Ink]

We charge 25% of the order total. As mentioned, if you don't charge, customers will always place rush orders, you won't be making any extra, you will get behind on other orders, you will be working yourself to death, and your profit margins will fall. You also have the chance to lose the customers whose orders are pushed back.

 

[TYGERON]

Yessssssss!!!!!

Everyone has said pretty much what I was going to say.

And in addition, if you take on a rush and charge for it, take extra steps to be absolutely sure everything is correct! Have the customer check and double check and sign off on final proofs. Be clear with a policy concerning mistakes or typos etc.

I say this because when people put money in your hands, not only are they trusting you, but sometimes they feel it gives them license trip. When rushed, the likelihood for errors can increase (by you and customer) and there's a heightend tension level already.

I take rush jobs on rare occasions and for long term, repeat customers because the extra money isn't worth the possible headache. I have a customer who just called sweatin' me over getting shirts by Friday that he ordered Tuesday. He offered money and offered to help. I told him I can mess up by myself...LOL!

 

[kirkmansigns]

100% markup for same day service, 75% for 2 day turnaround, 50% for 3 day turnaround, 25 % for 4 day turnaround. We usually have a normal 5 day service anyway. The upcharges will usually determine if they "really" need it as quick as they thought they did. If so, they pay. If they don't want to pay for faster service... they can plan ahead next time or take their rush rush rush business to another printer. It's really a type of job I don't care to do anyway. We have too many customers that plan ahead, get their art work approved on time, and are happy with a 5 day service.

 

[Zenergy]

I take it on a case by case basis. Here's two examples of how I've handled rush charges lately:

1.) Local church, regular customer with decent (50 - 200 shirt) orders. They needed 60 shirts for a choir thing they were doing that had just come up. 3 days, no rush charge, but I set the expectation that this was a one-time thing and if they needed more rush orders in the future I reserved the right to charge at my discretion.

2.) Google, during the SXSW conference. A buddy of mine landed a huge cost plus job doing custom art installations, and needed some shirts to go along with it. 50 shirts, 3 color 2 location, and a hard deadline of 36 hours. 500% markup and they were happy to pay it. $2750 for the job. I cleared around $2400 profit and the customer was happy because nobody else in town would touch it on that short of notice - with the conference, pretty much everybody in town was slammed.

The reason I only cleared $2400 was because I had another small job for a regular that I did for free because I couldn't meet their quoted timeframe. They were a little annoyed at first, but once I comped their order and explained why they were very understanding.

 

[aaronc]

rush charge aka a-hole tax. you're paying for my sleep, and paying for me to screw up my whole schedule of things. we budget our time and money so that we can satisfy our customers needs, if you want us to go above and beyond that, you have to pay for the convenience. I think it's pretty well-known that turnaround times average around a week. I've done 24hr flips before, it's not fun but if the money is right, and you have enough coffee on hand, it can be a good way to make some quick $

I'd say moreso than the fee you stand to collect, it is a tool to perhaps lock in a new client. I just took in an order from someone who needs it by Friday, all other print houses around said no, I'm taking it on knowing that if I impress them with this now (and make future terms very clear) that I just won myself a great new client. I'm quickly learning that people who have unreasonable expectations will always have unreasonable expectations, and that even if I was able to give them the shirts yesterday they'd still be unimpressed. If you're nice & gracious and it fits in to my schedule where I might have a hole, a couple days turn-time might not even get an extra charge.

 

[treefox2118]

We charge a standard posted rush fee that is fixed regardless of customers. We automatically bump wholesale customers up to the next fastest tier at no charge, though.

If people ask me why the added fees, I have a nice little tri-fold brochure that explains the process for screen print setups and why our regular pricing is low (we have good production scheduling tools).

I also explain that we're normally busy 48 hours a week, and I flip my press operators overtime to get them to do extra.

On top of that, I also tell them that in addition to the rush charge, a case of beer or a bottle of Whiskey won't be turned down -- and some of them actually slug it over when they pick them up.

Now that we added a basic DTG to the mix, we can handle the small rush jobs much easier, and I can already tell that my always last minute customers are really happy that we can knock out those terrible 15 shirt orders in a pinch, if needed.

I don't mind rush jobs, and we're always happy to take them: they cost us nothing extra since we actually DO use the rush fee to pay OT, and my press operators always love the extra work. We're working a third shift 3 nights this week for rush jobs, and no one complained about the added costs (or extra in their paycheck).

 

[mygivingtee]

No
You need to know your costs; keep you business streamlined; and deliver in 2 to 3 days consistently.
Or someone else will figure it out.