# Do ONLINE 'T-Shirt Designer' Sites Make Money?



## Stitch-Up (May 26, 2007)

Hi guys

I've looked at many sites that allow the potential customer to 'design' their own T-Shirt.

Whilst it all looks very snazzy, do these sites actually turn potential customers into purchasers?

We started off producing embroidered clothing and now do vinyl, printed vinyl & transfers too.

We have no web presence and think it's about time we did something about it.

We have stacks of pictures of our designs HERE

The BIG question is - does an online design site actually work or, are people put off by the complexity?

Cheers

John


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## lindsayanng (Oct 3, 2008)

wow, thats a pretty nice portfolio.. I can't really tell you if they do make money, as i dont own a t-shirt business, i run a photography business.. but anyways.. As for a t-shirt builder, did you want the customer to be able to to have free reign with where and what type of printing should be done? Or do you just want to offer a few options like:
Text across the front
image on right chest
image on left chest
large image/text on the back

Because as cool as most of those builders are, they do kind of have limitations as to what the customer can do, and there ARE some that allow the customer to move adn epand the image, but it doesnt add to the price, so someone who wants a small graphic on the right chest or someone who wants a huge graphic on the entire front will be charged the same.. So there is the main isssue i see from a business standpoint, then you have to decide where you want to put your pricepoint to cover the loss of the big image, but still make the small image affordable enough to make the customers want it.. 

Those are just my thoughts form a design standpoint.. maybe i am wrong and maybe there are programs out there than adjust for size vs price...


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## lindsayanng (Oct 3, 2008)

Oh yea.. I just had another idea... The embroider is a little easier to put on the shirts because people usually only have the embroidery on a few places on a shirt.. and you can give them an option to upload their own graphic, or choose form some premade ones that you did, and then offer text that they want on it.. that is very simple and doesnt really need a t-shirt designer


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## Stitch-Up (May 26, 2007)

Thanks for the comments lindsayanng

My problem is I ZERO web design/hosting/etc skills 

We use many different items of clothing from T-Shirts, polo-shirts to hats & socks! So what I'm wanting is a pre-made website with 'bells & whistles' (I guess they call it eCommerce) to cater for the various products, embroidery designs, vinyl & heat press AND allow people to upload their ideas for us to 'print' or embroider. In short, I'm looking for the complete 'off the shelf' solution 

I have tried 'rent-a-coder' and similar sites but you never get what you want.

Cheers

John


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## embgals (Dec 28, 2008)

John:

I don't have a t shirt designer site however I do have a website for my embroidered apparel and I can only speak for myself on my experience. My website is an e-commerce site and I work solely out of my home in a very very did I say very small community so I rely on 98% of my business on the web. I can tell you that if you market your site correctly and do some research and have great SEO your site should be an income generator for your business. I do all my own maintenance for my site as it is pretty easy to do and I also try and keep up with the SEO. It is not enough to have a website and think you will get business as SEO is the key to making your website a success. There is alot of free information on the web about SEO do's and don'ts and I suggest researching before jumping into things.

I have a niche site so it helps me in the sales area. I suggest trying to think of something that will set you apart from all the other embroidery companies on the web and build around that. People spend alot of money on sites and have them do nothing for them because of the lack of SEO knowledge. I spend about $20/month for my e-commerce site and it works for me.

Good Luck!

Tina K.
Embroidery Gals


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## Natitown (Apr 17, 2006)

embgals said:


> John:
> 
> I don't have a t shirt designer site however I do have a website for my embroidered apparel and I can only speak for myself on my experience. My website is an e-commerce site and I work solely out of my home in a very very did I say very small community so I rely on 98% of my business on the web. I can tell you that if you market your site correctly and do some research and have great SEO your site should be an income generator for your business. I do all my own maintenance for my site as it is pretty easy to do and I also try and keep up with the SEO. It is not enough to have a website and think you will get business as SEO is the key to making your website a success. There is alot of free information on the web about SEO do's and don'ts and I suggest researching before jumping into things.
> 
> ...


There is so much info out there for SEO. Do you know of any articles/books in particular that would help?


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## SBEMedia (Jun 26, 2008)

There are quite a few sites out there which will do fulfillment services for you, but I would have to say that since you are already acting as the fulfillment center, i.e. the one who is doing the producing, I'd look at PikiCentral as your software hosting system, we have used them for a quite awhile and are impressed with the service, as well as, all the functionality. They provide great tools, and you can always hire someone to do the programming, but with the Piki system its fairly easy.


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## Stitch-Up (May 26, 2007)

Thanks for the replies

I appreciate SEO (had to look that up) is important.

To date we've majored in the car market and mainly track type cars, most of it is small volume stuff but it's been quite good to date.

I've taken a look at a few eCommerce website solutions and they range from ££ to £££££££ or $$ to $$$$$$$. Piki I think is quite expensive for us just now so for the moment, I'll keep searching.

Cheers

John

PS Tina - can you send me a link to your site? I'd be grateful if you don't mind of course!


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## embgals (Dec 28, 2008)

Hey John!

Yes SEO is a very big part of having a website and you don't need to pay someone to get you to the top rankings of a search engine you just need to know a little SEO to get you to the top and you can do this yourself if you have time to do so.

I learned the hard way at first by trial and error and alot of searching and reading about SEO. I first started doing searches on the web for Free SEO lessons/information and just started reading and applying what they said and I then found a great Yahoo group that does free SEO lessons and website marketing you can find Crickets classes here: SEO Training - SEO Training Class - SEO Class

My website is hosted with PappaShop you can check them out here: 

http://www.pappashop.com/whmcs/aff.php?aff=194

My site is www.embroiderygals.com 

I used a free template provided by Pappashop as my starting point then I had a company do my webtopper/Logo and all my web graphics. The company I used is very reasonably priced and does great work and will help design the perferct graphic for your sites. Kim is the owner and you can find her and her business at www.craftisangraphics.com. 

I hope all this helps you guys and let me know if you need anything else or have any questions....

Happy New Year!

Tina


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## lindsayanng (Oct 3, 2008)

Ya know, i have been very happy with oscommerce, and i had just found out that there IS an addon for oscommerce that does everything you need.. The oscommerce software is free, butyou have to pay for the T-shirt designer.. 
Custom T-Shirt Intigration - Oscommerce Programming Project - Custom Web Development by Indianelite.com

Also, if you want some suggestions on who to hire to help you customize the rest of the site, PM me. I have my plate full right now, but i know some really good people out there that are reliable.


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