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slice&dice

Who started their entire business with just a single solid account?

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I was completing a job today, and realized that my entire business was started because this friend of a friend offered to give me a steady stream of sign work, and I realized that I could buy the equipment and open a storefront operation with just the income generated from this one account.

 

Here I am, several years later, and I still get ongoing orders from that same guy, which are easy to complete and provide me with a way to pay rent and cover other expenses.

 

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I started everything when i was 16 because of my brother paying me to wash his car, im 24 now and still doing a whole bunch of different car work. 

Hell he just paid me this weekend to detail his cars. 

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You had a customer? I started with an idea nothing more and less than $600 to invest.

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heck Jay I started with about 350 and that was a stretch.  just this week I ordered way more than that in supplies

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I had a slow week for supplies $100 at bestblank and $250 at uscutter. If you're like me you are going to cry at the end of the year when you see how much you spent in supplies. I haven't put my paperwork into quickbooks since May and at that time uscutter alone was $3600 or 6 times what I started with. Crazy when you think about how little most of us started with.

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I'm already crying Jay but hope that works out in the end - it should or I need to raise prices LOL

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Same here. I'm actually giving many of my regulars a heads up that first of the year most of my prices are going to have to go up due to supplier increase. I can't eat those increases (grimco bought out my local supplier) forever.

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Started out doing dye sub stuff for fun in my spare time and selling it on egay about 8 years ago, quickly got frustrated and bored with that and got a cutter, then a printer, then another cutter and a new printer. Started to get real customers after that.

Was laid off from my full time job back in 2008 and figured I would give this a go full time and never looked back. 

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You guys are giving me hope. I helped out a friends shop on and off till he closed the doors this year. I decided I still wanted to do my own stuff so got my Graphtec. Things are slowly picking up. Hopefully some day I can take the leap of faith and walk away from working for some else and go out on my own.

 

Thanks to all who come on here and share advice with us newbies.

 

Brad

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When I ordered my first cutter I didn't know the difference between a vector and a jpg. In the week it took to arrive I read everything on the net that I could. You're already ahead of where I started.

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You guys are giving me hope. I helped out a friends shop on and off till he closed the doors this year. I decided I still wanted to do my own stuff so got my Graphtec. Things are slowly picking up. Hopefully some day I can take the leap of faith and walk away from working for some else and go out on my own.

 

Thanks to all who come on here and share advice with us newbies.

 

Brad

 

Brad, that's kinda why I started this thread --- to allow people to show how they managed to begin earning decent money from basically scratch. I'm sure there are thousands of similar stories, all across the USA.

 

We are members of a very important part of American enterprise (sign makers), and I'm proud to have shared advice and provided others with the same good feelings I have come to experience.

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reading the thread title just brings me back to high school - I can just hear cheech and chong now

 

man after roll(ing) just one the creative juices just get flowing and we are off!  eyebulge.gif1357160365imgres.jpg

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Would this explain the psychedelic avatar you have.

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I'm just starting (again), just purchased my screen printing equipment about 20 minutes ago,  looking at cutters now, don't have a single account, but have a pretty good plan (at least i think so).  Luckily i'm blessed with a very supportive wife, and she's on board 100%.  By the time the weeks over, i'll  probably be about $5000 in the hole.  Gonna be fun, looking forward to laying ink, and cutting vinyl again.  Just hope my full time job doesn't interfere this time.

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You had a customer? I started with an idea nothing more and less than $600 to invest.

Same here. $500 in my pocket and 1 call to USCUTTER and here I am today 3 years later and much more then 1 cutter LoL

 

shoot i did my first job on a cricut machine  6x12 lol

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I'm just starting (again), just purchased my screen printing equipment about 20 minutes ago,  looking at cutters now, don't have a single account, but have a pretty good plan (at least i think so).  Luckily i'm blessed with a very supportive wife, and she's on board 100%.  By the time the weeks over, i'll  probably be about $5000 in the hole.  Gonna be fun, looking forward to laying ink, and cutting vinyl again.  Just hope my full time job doesn't interfere this time.

Good Luck!!!

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I started about 2 years ago. Didnt know what a cutter was. I had a bike that I wanted to redo graphics and paint. Ended up selling the bike for supplies and equipment and now im at the point where vinyl and full time job just dont work. Dropping my employment to go full in the vinyl industry. Been making about 6 times what I make at work and mot of that is Amazon. Need to upgtade my cutter though. But otherwise im diving in. Love this business. Sometimes challenging, fun, and seems to be a good source of income.

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This afternnon, I was eating a slice of pizza at a local joint, got to talking with the owner and he placed an order right there on the spot for bandit signs (18x24 coro)

 

Ahhhhhhhh, barter pizza !!!!!

Da best !!!!

 

pizza.jpg

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I've been doing sublimation for about a year now . Going to buy a cutter in the next few weeks. this is giving me hope that I can make a go of it. :rolleyes:

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You had a customer? I started with an idea nothing more and less than $600 to invest.

 

 

Im in your shoes now. I have $700 to invest. I work full time. But I hope I get somehwere with this.

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I started about 2 years ago. Didnt know what a cutter was. I had a bike that I wanted to redo graphics and paint. Ended up selling the bike for supplies and equipment and now im at the point where vinyl and full time job just dont work. Dropping my employment to go full in the vinyl industry. Been making about 6 times what I make at work and mot of that is Amazon. Need to upgtade my cutter though. But otherwise im diving in. Love this business. Sometimes challenging, fun, and seems to be a good source of income.

 

 

awesome, love that story.

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I bought mine to make airbrush paint masks for painting RC car bodies. Soon after I got it, friends started hitting me up for decals, then off road shop gave me my real first break. I still do all their windshield banners and other decals. I have acquired many other customers since, but its them that gave me my first real break in this industry.

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