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ashkore21

thinking of making the plung.

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So here is my dilema. I been pushing decals off facebook and its been working. slowly growing and i enjoy it. my end goal is to save for a large printer for vinyl wrapping cars. however this seems like a very good buisness oppratunity to do t-shirts and continue to do decals in the process and let my friend run that part of the buisness as i focus on my dream which is the car side of it. so before i take the plung into t-shirts, i am just curious on what to look into for a heat press. are the combos good? i was looking at something like https://www.amazon.com/dp/B073QPY2W8?th=1 to get started. but im not 100% how they do. i also found a few on craigslist that are aournd 150-200$.  I still have to read up on what all can be used. i know HVT for basic prints which i will proably use for now. Any information i will glady take and thanks in advance!

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If you already have a vinyl cutter, then a heat press and HTV would do shirts, with all the limitations and benefits.  HTV is normally not a printed material.  Maybe you are thinking of printed vinyl transfers.

A printer that can do car wraps is likely a eco-solvent print cut combo.  You can use one of those for shirts, with a heat press.  There are transfers these eco-solvent printers can make and applied with a heat press.

However, HTV and printed transfers are not idea for large production runs.  It's really hard to say do 200 shirts this way.  Ten yes, but large quantities are hard.  Screen printing is the solution for quantity.

Doing car wraps is far more profitable.  However, its takes a great deal more experience than one might imagine.  Likely you would have to go to a 3-7 day training program that might cost a few thousand to get started.  It generally also requires a garage or a car bay.

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printed transfers for shirts can be done with a cheap pigment printer and material like JPSS or 3G opaque 
on the wrap end see how many people in your market are doing it first before you invest $20,000-$25,000 for solvent or $8K +4K (for laminator) with latex  as you will need to keep the printer in constant production to make it worth the investment - having a couple lined up is different than having enough to cover the cost of equipment, depreciation, and be ready to replace the equipment down the road as needed.   visiting a show like the NBM or something similar in your area will help you to see the equipment needed.   many people have "wanted" to do the work and invested to lose large amounts of money  - others have made a good business of doing it but they work many hours - - - expect to pay more for a roll of good wrap vinyl and laminate than you would pay for a graphtec or roland plotter - and that is just a roll of each to do the job.    research will be your best friend on this adventure - find someone in your area with experience to go see the operation.  and like dcbevins said take the class - things like wrapping bumpers and mirrors is not as easy as it shows on a youtube video made my someone doing it for years

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I just read a post locally with a guy offering a full wrap on an s-10 extended cab for $1200 - tell me how that makes financial sense with everything else involved (material, labor, depreciation and design time)  was posted on a local exchange site

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I Thank you guys for the replies. So here is my thing. its not just cars. i have many many people interested from track cars, to trailers, to cars, to sprint cars. I have the market around me and in my area there are only 3 shops and they focus on commercial. When they do private vehicle they run approx 2-3k for a mid size color change. I have currently a guys that can print the material if i need a custom job done for 6$ per sq/ft as well so its not a huge rush. but also at the same time is why i am thinking of doing this as a side of the business to the car stuff. 

 

My plan was to buy a large printer and a laminator as you stated. Most jobs that people want around here are color changes and things like "chrome" or psychedelic. Im saving also right now for a little better place to do it. but that is all to come. hence why im thinking of getting a press to generate more income. 

 

as for the person offering 1200 bucks it sounds like he is screwing himself out of money big time or the money is not there. or he is just offering color change from rolls with no custom prints.

 

you said HVT is bad for big orders? like if i did a fundraiser? what kind of printer if i got one before would work for the JPSS or 3g? would the 8 in 1 i posted https://www.amazon.com/dp/B073QPY2W8?th=1 work? or stay away from?

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I would recommend staying away from a multi platform press. I suggest a decent swing away press and you will want at least a 15" x 15" size. The reason for the larger size is that getting a shirt lined up square is much easier on a larger platen. Without your shirt square to something it is then hard to get a square to the world logo placement. A 16" x 20" is even better IMO but you can live with a 15" to start with and decide if you can build up that side of things and invest in something bigger and better later. HTV is great for orders from 1 to 25 or 30. I have done much larger orders than that with success but they had just a small 4" logo. As soon as you get a lot of coverage area the cost of the vinyl plus the effort to cut and weed soon price you out of the market (on volume orders). For short runs there is really very little set up costs with HTV so you have the advantage over a screen print operation that has to burn screens. 

As far as printed graphics on the shirts I think you'll find the options more limited. The JPSS is pretty good on white cotton or 50/50 but not good on colored shirts. The 3G mentioned above is an alternative for dark shirts but it is pretty sucky as far as feel (called "hand") I do a few but usually try to talk my customers out of it of I can. I know there are HTV options that you can print on should you end up with a solvent printer but just like the 3G you end up with too much vinyl on your chest and it makes a sweat box as well as feeling heavy and uncomfortable. The DTG guys rule that world but are similarly expensive and limited application. Best market to bust into it with is HTV at the start. There are custom wholesale screen print transfers you can buy from places like F&M Expressions that you can use your own heat press and they just build your screen prints on a paper transfer sheet. This is what I do to compete with the screen printers when I have a volume order too large for HTV. 

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