# Quote for my first order



## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Hi guys,

I got a quote for my first order. Before I proceed with it wanted to see what everyone thought of the pricing.

5 color design | all water based print | 24 pieces

$75 screens ($15/screen) + $116.40 printing ($4.85/shirt)+$13.40 tax = $204.80

What do you think - fair price, bargain, too much?

Also to clarify - why exactly am I being charged tax?


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## bac (Jun 19, 2006)

Does this price include the shirts? If so, what shirt?


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## rusty (Feb 9, 2007)

Sounds pretty cheap to me, even without shirts.

Tax is charged if you are in the same state. If you have a tax ID # and plan to resale these shirts and charge tax on them, you should not have to pay taxes.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

bac said:


> Does this price include the shirts? If so, what shirt?


No, this is just for printing services. For this particular design I'll be using one of the Continental's blanks (which given the low quantities will cost me approx. $4.50 or so per shirt)


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

rusty said:


> Sounds pretty cheap to me, even without shirts.
> 
> Tax is charged if you are in the same state. If you have a tax ID # and plan to resale these shirts and charge tax on them, you should not have to pay taxes.


Thanks rusty, that's what I thought too based on the info I've read here already. I'll talk to the printer about the tax, I believe I should be exempt.


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

Are the screen fees a one time price?

If I'm adding it right, it sounds like about $8 for just the printing for your first run. With your shirts at $4.50, that puts you at about $12-$13 for a finished product cost. What is your retail price that you'll be selling the shirts for?

Since it's a smaller run, the numbers seem pretty close (I haven't gotten a quote for water based screen printing yet, so I don't know if it's more expensive).

If the screens are a one time fee, then it will make your future orders much less expensive


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Rodney, thanks a lot for your input. Your calculations are about right. That's not including labels, packaging for the customer, website maintenance etc and of course the worst of them all - shipping lol. So in general this particular order will be pricey, like I mentioned before because of the low quantity. Now I still can't figure out from the tone of your post - is this an ok point to start at, the $13/shirt cost?
RE: my retail price - no idea yet. Need to work on that separately. And I'm going to email the printer about the screen fees. I's sure those are one time, I can't see why they wouldn't be. (?)


> Since it's a smaller run, the numbers seem pretty close


 when you said close - what did you mean, close to plastisol pricing? If so, then given the number of colors and # shirts if the price is close to plastisol, than this is not bad? 
Thanks again
BTW - printer is charging additional .25c on top of their regular plastisol price per color per shirt to do waterbased.


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## Vtec44 (Apr 24, 2006)

It depends on your market and quality of the print/shirt, but $13 cost per shirt seems a bit high IMHO. The retail price is generally about twice the per-shirt cost.


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## custom tshirts (Mar 1, 2007)

that sounds like a great price. Way cheaper than I would expect to pay. Make sure there are no other charges.


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## Fluid (Jun 20, 2005)

we're 2.75 per print for normal plasticol inks. Not sure why waterbased would be more other than dif emulsion yet at the low print run I would say your in the ballpark.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

James, it is a bit high, but again I think it's the number of shirts that's throwing this off.

Richard, the way they describe the difference is that they consider waterbased print a discharge print and they charge .25c extra/color/shirt for discharge.

Thanks a lot everyone. I'm feeling good about this.


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

> Now I still can't figure out from the tone of your post - is this an ok point to start at, the $13/shirt cost?


That's because the "OK"-ness would depend on how much you plan on selling your t-shirts for at retail 

If you are trying to sell for $15-$20, then a $13 product cost, not including relabeling, packaging, website hosting, etc (customer pays the shipping, so I don't factor that in), then it seems like you aren't leaving yourself much room for profit.

If you are selling high end t-shirts that will go for $30-$60 retail, then you have plenty of room for profit.



> when you said close - what did you mean, close to plastisol pricing? If so, then given the number of colors and # shirts if the price is close to plastisol, than this is not bad?


The $4.85 for just the printing on 25 t-shirts seems priced about right for regular screen printing.

I think it's the setup fees that are skewing the pricing to seem high and eating into your potential profits.


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## Fluid (Jun 20, 2005)

Annushka, we do the same. I cahrge $0.25 extra per color for discharge additives. Depending on the deisgn and garment color regular plasticol inks can be thinned back with a cureable reducer to get the waterbased feel/hand to the print.

Im sure youll be able to find someone cheaper and some more expensive, looks like your in the ballpark and if your satisfied with the printer and their quality I would not fret over the charges. Sometimes, actually most of the time you get what you pay for.

Good luck and let us know how they turn out


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Thank you guys. Sorry for the late reply, I didn't realize the thread was updated.

I'll keep you posted on how it goes.


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## aust1025 (Mar 1, 2007)

I just charged someone $345.00 for a full case of one color shirts, white print on front. I got the shirts for around 1.80 a piece so...


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## BabyFashionistas (Feb 16, 2007)

*Need HELP finding a good printing company*

Hi,
I am just getting setup in the t-shirt business, supplying t-shirts for the baby|toddler marke, however I am not interested in doing the printing. I am looking for a very good printer in the US that provides good quality and excellent pricing. I thought I had found a printer about 1 week ago, when they finally got back to me with bad news. The printer told me that they cannot print on shirts and onesies that I purchased wholesale and that I would have to purchase my shirts from them. Can anyone assist with finding a good Printing company that does not expect you to purchae the items from them. Please HElP!


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## Jasonda (Aug 16, 2006)

Georgette,

Look in your phone book under "Screen Printing" and just call a few places. Ask them if you can bring your own blanks. They will probably charge you a little more money for doing that, but you should be able to find someone to do it.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Hi folks, here's a follow up to my first order. Turnaround was 14 business days, artwork did not require any work, I emailed it to them they said it was fine as is. Overall the shirts came out just they way I had imagined them. I tried to be as specific as possible about everything and they did a great job fulfilling the order. The shipping was much less than I was expecting - about $10 and 3 days for delivery. The only thing is that 8 shirts had some major registration problems, where the screens didn't align properly, resulting in either images overlapping each other, or borders being far off from the fill etc 
What do u guys think of that number - 8 out 24 being no good? I do leave room for error, I'm just not sure if this is too much or it's bearable.
Their communication is ticking me off a little, or at least starting  I emailed my sales rep on sunday letting know I received the shirts and about the damaged shirts, I haven't heard back from him yet. 
I've been looking for my camera for the past 2 days, can't find it anywhere, but as soon as I do I'll take some pics for this post.


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## rusty (Feb 9, 2007)

Annushka said:


> The only thing is that 8 shirts had some major registration problems, where the screens didn't align properly, resulting in either images overlapping each other, or borders being far off from the fill etc
> What do u guys think of that number - 8 out 24 being no good? I do leave room for error, I'm just not sure if this is too much or it's bearable.


I think 8 bad ones of 24 is terrible. That's 1/3 of your order (I was a math major ). I'm a screen printer and I won't even sell 1 shirt out of 24 that is not registered properly (that I'm aware of). Every T-shirt I sell represents me and my company. There's no way I'd allow poorly registered shirts to go out the door. And I'd be very upset if I paid for shirts that came like that. If that had happened to me, I'd have sent the bad ones back and tell them to get it right or give me my money back. Of course if it was just a mistake in quality control, they should be happy to print you up 8 more good ones at their expense. Just my opinion  

Of course my personality is that of a perfectionist, so I notice every little flaw in any shirt. I'm guessing that most people might not even notice they were out of register, but I would. But I do see people wearing shirts all the time that are not registered properly.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Thanks Rusty, I need to hear some opinions to see how to handle this. In my email to them I let them come up with a solution. The way they resolve it, it they do at all, is going to tell me if I were to do more business with them or not. And this is another instance where communication was lacking - I hate surprises and it be nice if they told me about the problem before I discovered it myself. That would show me that they are more in control of their own operation.


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## sachi (Mar 22, 2007)

The quotes I've been getting allow for spoilage. I'd say the average is 2%, slightly more on darks. The more reputable printers I've contacted promise to credit for spoilage in excess of this.


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## neato (Mar 21, 2006)

8 out of 24 is bad.

Actually, I don't see why any of them would be out of registration unless they were using a cheap press.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

sachi said:


> The quotes I've been getting allow for spoilage. I'd say the average is 2%, slightly more on darks. The more reputable printers I've contacted promise to credit for spoilage in excess of this.


thanks sachi. that number sounds more reasonable.

I threw a little fit about the damaged shirts and the sales rep not responding and the CEO of the comp. got in touch with me. I emailed him some pics but i don't think they could see anything from the pics (my camera is terrible). Anyways, he asked me to mail the goods to them for credit which I agreed. I'm going to give them another try with my next order and then we'll see from there. 
BTW - the screen charges are not a one time fee. It's $15 per screen each time you order. 

Here are the pics, hope you can see something there  The first one looks like the flowers are blurry but actually that's the defect - the frame of the image is off from the fill so it looks off. And there a couple of shirts that had this random paint stain that was not part of the design, I'm returning those as well.


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## rusty (Feb 9, 2007)

Yeah, that's very sloppy printing. Hopefully they will make it right.


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## Solmu (Aug 15, 2005)

Annushka said:


> And there a couple of shirts that had this random paint stain that was not part of the design, I'm returning those as well.


Those are absolutely *terrible*. I am absolutely appalled that they were let out of the shop. When you said "random paint stain" I was thinking maybe they forgot to tape off a screen, but no... they're just *extremely* sloppy.

Given that it's in the same place on both shirts it's possible a hole developed in their screen. I don't know, or particularly care, how it happened - there's no excuse for sending something that shoddy to the client.


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## scpromos (May 27, 2006)

I would start looking for someone else ASAP! Those aren't minor errors. I get a feeling you'll always have those types of problems with this company.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Solmu said:


> I am absolutely appalled that they were let out of the shop. .


That's what made me really mad. It was saying to me that either a) they had no quality control system or b) hoping I wouldn't notice or not say anything, I don't even know. 



> I would start looking for someone else ASAP! Those aren't minor errors. I get a feeling you'll always have those types of problems with this company.


I just wish it was easier to find printers that'd be willing to work under my particular circumstances. Low minimums, decent set up charges, not to mention that it's a challenge to find folks that'll do waterbased printing. I know they are out there but as far as the whole "package" that'd work for me - these guys had it. Plus I'm really pressed on time, I have about 10 or so designs that I need at least 30 prototypes of each to be printed by the mid June-July.

I don't know what to do right now. Thank you for your responses everyone, very helpful.


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## Bill Hood (Apr 11, 2007)

Price is always a subjective item. One printer will charge a price that will meet his overhead costs and leave him with enough money for his future growth, while the guy right down the street will print the same exact job for three times the price. They both are busy and making money.

The difference is often in the quality of the work, the turnaround times, the service that is given before, during and after the job is printed and the likeability factor of the printer. If you can satisfy more needs than the other guy you can charge more and get it. I always prefer to work with those I like, regardless of price. I always prefer to go with quality over price. These are just things which are important to me as an individual.

Whenever I have mechanical problems with my Jeep, I go to RCR Automotive Repair here in Austin. It is owned by a woman named Delphina, who is extremely honest (always a plus in the auto repair business) and does all the work herself or she personally supervises her crew. She charges a fair price, but it is not the least expensive price in town. She does what she says she will do and she finishes it when she says. I am happy to work with her and pay her price.

In this case, if you like the printer, they are convenient, the quality is good, the service is good, they deliver on time, and you can sell the printed shirts at a profit, then be happy - you are getting far more than most folks.


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## Fluid (Jun 20, 2005)

Annushka, why are you stuck on waterbased? You can acheive a soft hand with plasticols and discharge. 




> always prefer to work with those I like, regardless of price. I always prefer to go with quality over price. These are just things which are important to me as an individual.


Bill I have to agree. The old saying you get what you pay for always seems to be the case for most. I dont think this applies to the issues above yet does in most cases.


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## Annushka (Jul 26, 2006)

Richard, I have a couple of designs that really want waterbased type of print - the artwork itself plus the blanks are going to be super sheer. Soft hand plastisol is next on my "to do" list. I've been reading about it here and it definitely sounds like someting I'd like try. I've already asked this printer if they can do it, I'm waiting for an answer. I would really like to see a print done that way before I commit an order though. I requested a sample plastisol print shirt from them 2 weeks ago, sales rep promised to send me one with my shirts - never saw a thing.
One of the forum members-printer promised me a sample, I look forward to it. 
Speaking of discharge - this printer told me that my order was done waterbase/discharge. He told me it was the same thing. And it was the reason why they didn't catch the defects early - because it's discharge, you can't really see the print until it's cured. Is this making sense?


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## neato (Mar 21, 2006)

The comment on not seeing it until it was cured makes sense. 

But 8 out of 24? 

They should have noticed it ONCE and made the corrections.

I honestly can't believe those two marks. That is sloppy printing.


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