# selling t-shirts, easyy!!, managing business, hardd!!... need accounting and managment tips (ebay based)



## freestylezz (Oct 21, 2007)

hello all,
posting a threat after a long time here, mainly been busy selling t-shirts on ebay...
i am about 3 months into this business and doing just about fine... only problems i am facing are keeping track of my cash flow (lol) and managing it in overall sense... 

i sell t-shirts on auction only (dont have ebay store), i sell about 40% of my inventory on weekly basis... about 30-35 t-shirts are day

i charge same amount for all sizes and all type t-shirts, and the sizes i offer are youth small to adult xl... so my profit per t-shirt is flat so my accounting is basically (if i sold 200 Tz a week, i made 200 x profit per tshirt) which i know is not the right way to keep track of 

now making t-shirts doesnt take as long as operating ebay so i need tips on how to manage it better on ebay

when i receive an order, i type it down on MS word... the t-shirt title, the item no., size/color and the shipping address... 

and after the t-shirt is made, i copy the shipping address on a different word file so i can print it on a sticker paper (8x11, multiple address are being printed here) and when the item is shipped, i have to "mark it as shipped" and marking 30-35 t-shirts as shipped alone takes about half an hour 

and i have no source of accounting data what so ever... only the paypal invoices

making 30 t-shirts takes only 3 hours but making the orders ready, marking them as shipped, answersing emails takes up about 4-6 hours and i want to cut down this time

are there any good accouting softwares that are compatible with ebay, how about any program for managing orders

any advice will be greatly appriciated


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## pshawny (Feb 27, 2008)

Quickbooks might work good for you.

Got a link to your ebay auctions?


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## sjidohair (Apr 9, 2008)

What is your link on ebay I would love to check your tees out,,


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## ambitious (Oct 29, 2007)

I have to agree, quickbooks should do the trick.


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## SkullDude (May 10, 2008)

I manage everything in excel perfectly fine and have sold over 300 t shirts in a month. A lot depends on your individual needs. There are quite a few very large ebay sellers that only use Excel. Excel does have some limitations though and I am planning on switching over to Quickbooks soon.


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## CxCthreads (Dec 2, 2008)

SkullDude said:


> I manage everything in excel perfectly fine and have sold over 300 t shirts in a month. A lot depends on your individual needs. There are quite a few very large ebay sellers that only use Excel. Excel does have some limitations though and I am planning on switching over to Quickbooks soon.


Hey bro, any chance you can send me a sample of your excel sheet? (obviously without your numbers in it).

I'm just trying to get an idea of how other people set there stuff up using excel.

If that's cool, my e-mails [email protected] 

Thanks much


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## SpitBuck (Feb 23, 2009)

Quickbooks is the most professional and best way to go.

It is fairly easy and your customers will really like the professionalism of it, and it works great for tracking.

As far as shipping, if you are taking money via PayPal. Use the multi order PayPal shipping tool. It will save you TONS of time. Just order up some labels (or order free FedEx labels, they work with the PayPal shipping for USPS). All your packages should be the same weight and shipped out of the same size package, so you will only need one size profile. You will be able to prepare 50 orders and 50 labels in under 20 minutes. As far as order tracking from eBay, I highly recommend Blackthorne, although it is not free, it is a REAL time saver and great for handling orders quickly and efficiently. Blackthorne will also allow you to insert your cost on each item and you can see your total profit at the end.

I ran a fairly large business on a website and eBay for 2 years, and can tell you through all my trials and errors that this is the way to go.


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## greyhorsewoman (Jul 19, 2007)

Ebay has a place where you can print out an 'invoice' for your records with everything on it to make the shirt.

You can use the individual or multi-label resource to PayPal to print labels already to stick to your outgoing packages (and it will print a packing slip too if you want). 

Then I keep an Excel spreadsheet of those invoices so I can see how I am doing month to month. You can expand to include Paypal/Ebay fees if you can see what those are adding up to. 

Quicken for Business has been enough for me to keep track my business income/expenses since I don't do invoicing or inventory on it. 

Bookkeeping is time consuming ... but is a very real and necessary part of doing business. Streamline it, but don't ignore it.


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## Jamey (Dec 22, 2008)

SpitBuck said:


> Quickbooks is the most professional and best way to go.
> 
> It is fairly easy and your customers will really like the professionalism of it, and it works great for tracking.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the tips!


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## flirteegirl (Apr 10, 2007)

Do a google search for accounting software and you should do a comparision on what you think will work best for you. Quickbooks is very common but there are a host of other software available that is a lot more affordable and will grow with your business. Also, if you have any questions, PM me. By day, I am an accountant/business analyst and by night, a tee shirt designer. I also co-own two successful businesses (auto repair/car dealership; and publishing/production company). I have an accounting degree and MBA for creditability but would rather design and sell tee shirts.


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## Vanekkkkk (Jun 26, 2014)

Hi!
It's indeed a big problem for me as well.
As for now I have chosen vTiger which is a highly customizable CRM/MIS/ERP all-in-one.
I would appreciate any advice on a more convenient and less bureaucratic system.


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