Keeley

Small business start up- best budget model?

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Hey all,

 

I have a friend who successfully sells on Amazon who suggested I delve into the world of selling decals! I have a Cricut Air Explore 2 which would work well for a marketplace like Etsy but I want to reach Amazon. The Cricut Explore Air2 can only cut up to 24 inches at a time. A similar machine, the Silhouette Cameo, can cut up to 10 ft but I've read mixed reviews. I cannot hear the Cricut once I behind a closed door which is a plus because I work out of my home. I can't find exactly how fast it cuts vinyl so I can't really compare to anything else. I've read that the Cameo is slower than the Cricut.  I need faster output. Since I haven't sold a thing yet I can't justify purchasing anything top of the line, but I eventually plan on it. I read lots of mixed reviews on the USCutter MH Line but I need something where I can successfully produce more. How loud are these things? You can't hear the Cricut if the door is closed but it can take 10 mins to cut a detailed sq ft of decals. No contour cutting required! I'm comfortable learning any software. For now I can only spend at the very most $400.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I'm in the SF Bay area and I can't find anywhere that I can see equipment in action to decide for myself. It's hard to shop for an investment online!

 

Thanks everyone!

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Stay away from the MH cutters, they are bottom of the barrel cutters and very prone to static issues,  limited memory, as well as tracking problems.    Anything higher is best.  I would not consider running any type of business with a Cricut or Cameo.  What has your friend suggested?

If your going to sell decals, first find a niche'. Not copy from what everyone else does, or your just competing against the lowest price.  Small decals have no profit.    You would just be spinning your wheels and going no where.  And do not do copyrighted items.   Even if you see others selling them.  You can be sued and kept in the courts a very long time. Those lawyers just look for people doing their copyrights and those businesses have more money to pay their lawyers than you do. 

Personally my niche' is large decals.  And I mean large   I would much rather sell large decal sets for $50-$150 which takes no longer than 60 minutes start to finish.  

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1 hour ago, MZ SKEETER said:

Stay away from the MH cutters, they are bottom of the barrel cutters and very prone to static issues,  limited memory, as well as tracking problems.    Anything higher is best.  I would not consider running any type of business with a Cricut or Cameo.  What has your friend suggested?

If your going to sell decals, first find a niche'. Not copy from what everyone else does, or your just competing against the lowest price.  Small decals have no profit.    You would just be spinning your wheels and going no where.  And do not do copyrighted items.   Even if you see others selling them.  You can be sued and kept in the courts a very long time. Those lawyers just look for people doing their copyrights and those businesses have more money to pay their lawyers than you do. 

Personally my niche' is large decals.  And I mean large   I would much rather sell large decal sets for $50-$150 which takes no longer than 60 minutes start to finish.  

Thanks for your reply! I make all my own graphics or purchase extended licenses for the vectors that I think will sell well. No way in hell do I want to get sued! I have my niche picked out and I'm raring to go. My friend makes around $5000 a month utilizing amazon prime. I'm comfortable with that! He uses a Titan 2. Yes I had a feeling that the  MH models sucked. I would love to spend $1500 on a better model but it's just not in the cards right now. What do you recommend for something under the $1000 range? Since I'm in the Bay Area there's a ton of local competition for big decals

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Side note: I'm considering the Titan (1). Best I can do for price..trying to find minimum vinyl width? I have a bunch of 12" width rolls now. Also, it sounds like the cutters have trouble cutting small..can these handle cutting out something less than an inch? So many questions 

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Have you considered the SC2?  It seems to fall between the MH and Titan.  I have one and am happy with it so far.  It has steppers though so it's not going to be as quiet as the servo machines, but seems to cut very well and I think it just barely meets your price requirements.

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For under $1000,  the Titan 2,  it has a servo motor, more accurate, and quiet.   A 24" width is standard width for a vinyl cutter.  12" wide rolls work just fine on a 24" cutter.  The  value cutters can do smaller text, but not as good as a cutter with a servo motor. Will take a lot more tinkering with it. You do not want a cutter below 24". 

The Titan 2 is on sale right now for $799, best bet for a servo cutter.  Saving $200

https://www.uscutter.com/Titan-2-SE-Vinyl-Cutter

Why are you worried about what others are doing in the Bay Area?   I thought you are selling online.. I live in a small town in the midwest.  I only sell online and have no problems doing it. I sell to 50 states.    It also takes a lot of hoops to jump to sell on Amazon. A guy on here just went thru that.  

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1 hour ago, MZ SKEETER said:

For under $1000,  the Titan 2,  it has a servo motor, more accurate, and quiet.   A 24" width is standard width for a vinyl cutter.  12" wide rolls work just fine on a 24" cutter.  The  value cutters can do smaller text, but not as good as a cutter with a servo motor. Will take a lot more tinkering with it. You do not want a cutter below 24". 

The Titan 2 is on sale right now for $799, best bet for a servo cutter.  Saving $200

https://www.uscutter.com/Titan-2-SE-Vinyl-Cutter

Why are you worried about what others are doing in the Bay Area?   I thought you are selling online.. I live in a small town in the midwest.  I only sell online and have no problems doing it. I sell to 50 states.    It also takes a lot of hoops to jump to sell on Amazon. A guy on here just went thru that.  

I suppose I just assumed that large decals were sold more in person to help them apply the decal. Or maybe falling asleep lol

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There are many graphic installers out there that do this for a living..  Many people install their own decals.  Many videos on you tube to install vinyl graphics, of any size.   I started with large graphics from the git go.  I use up scraps from the larger to make smaller decals, just so that it doesn't go to waste.  Those decals are just my time..   I don't apply anything,  I work from my home.  I am probably quite a bit older than you are, I worked at a factory for 30 years and it closed. So I reinvented myself, and have been doing this for 12 years. 

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For now I can only spend at the very most $400.

SC2 is clearly at your price point, and for just $40 more than the 24" you can go up to the 30" model.

Keep in mind that consumables are also part of your start-up expenses (vinyl & app tape).

Have fun!

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58 minutes ago, slice&dice said:

For now I can only spend at the very most $400.

SC2 is clearly at your price point, and for just $40 more than the 24" you can go up to the 30" model.

Keep in mind that consumables are also part of your start-up expenses (vinyl & app tape).

Have fun!

   OP stated. " What do you recommend for something under the $1000 range?"  to my reply.   Which is why I stated the Titan 2. (I should have added SE)  OP has vinyl,   12" rolls to use for now.  I would expect she has tape also. She said "she is looking at Titan 1, " it is on sale with a a few extras for $719.99    The Titan 2 SE  is the best deal. It has a servo motor. 

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and the titan2 is a servo cutter within the price range - why not go with the finer detail servo motor than a stepper motor - much quieter too

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I wanted to be as budget conscious as possible, but I also don't want to turn out bad product. I also live on a 2nd floor so a servo motor would be ideal. It's just the fear of taking the plunge, spending almost a grand, and not being successful. I also worry that if I were to make my own website I wouldn't get the widespread audience that I would with Amazon Prime. I so appreciate all of your comments. I think I need to call USCutters and request they bring a showroom to northern ca :D

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remember a titan is a stepper motor and a titan2 or 3 have servo motors - both have much improved chipsets for the usb over the value cutters.

if you ask a salesman for advice he will steer you toward his highest commission as the turnover on sales staff is very high - the user forum have people with real world experience.   Heard last week a salesman was recommending the cheap chinese blades over the cleancut blades - now other than 2 member I know of that would disagree try to find very many that would agree with that - that have actually used cleancut blades and cheap blades.    the people on the forum including the mods are not paid and actual users of the equipment

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Even if you don't hit big and rake in lots of money the higher end machines are still a good idea as they will pay for themselves eventually even if you do nothing more than use them as a hobby and sell stuff to friends and family. And if/when you decide you want to get out of it all together they'll have a higher resale as well.

Basically what I'm saying, is don't worry about throwing the money away, it'll come back eventually. 

Regarding amazon vs person web page, I can't speak much to that other than to say when I think of custom/personalized stuff, I don't think of Amazon so i question how much traffic would you actually see.

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It's the difference between: 

Just spending money and spending money wisely.............

Sue2 

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I'm with all the previous posts. We usually recommend to buy the best you can afford but the water gets a little murky in the middle. There is the super budget MH which is truly for the very timid and also one that is the hardest to make work well. The next few steps up are pretty similar until you start into the servo motors and then there is another jump up to higher quality. I think those who have the servo titans have good luck and the new SC seems to do pretty well for itself as a stepper. I started with a Creation P-Cut which they no longer offer but was at the time a small step above the SC. Probably below the new SC2 would be my guess. I ran it for a couple years and got by. Learned a lot of valuable lessons that you won't learn with a higher end because they just work without a bunch of adjustment. I saved up and finally dropped a few thousand on my current cutter and wow what a difference. 

If you buy a cutter and take the time to learn the whole gambit you will definitely earn a return if you are even remotely savvy. The whole gambit includes graphic work, using your cutter, application, and most likely other offshoot branches such as heat transfer vinyl (t-shirts).  For me this started out as a new hobby and POTENTIAL revenue stream. 7 years later we did 80K gross income in our dining room in the evenings and weekends. Even if I ever get tired of it being WORK I will never be without a vinyl cutter again in my life (if I have any choice in the matter.) WAY TOO MUCH FUN and the absolute first hobby I have ever had that actually MAKES money instead of costing. I still do lots of freebie funs stuff for friends and family which is why I bought the stuff in the first place. 

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2 hours ago, Wildgoose said:

I'm with all the previous posts. We usually recommend to buy the best you can afford but the water gets a little murky in the middle. There is the super budget MH which is truly for the very timid and also one that is the hardest to make work well. The next few steps up are pretty similar until you start into the servo motors and then there is another jump up to higher quality. I think those who have the servo titans have good luck and the new SC seems to do pretty well for itself as a stepper. I started with a Creation P-Cut which they no longer offer but was at the time a small step above the SC. Probably below the new SC2 would be my guess. I ran it for a couple years and got by. Learned a lot of valuable lessons that you won't learn with a higher end because they just work without a bunch of adjustment. I saved up and finally dropped a few thousand on my current cutter and wow what a difference. 

If you buy a cutter and take the time to learn the whole gambit you will definitely earn a return if you are even remotely savvy. The whole gambit includes graphic work, using your cutter, application, and most likely other offshoot branches such as heat transfer vinyl (t-shirts).  For me this started out as a new hobby and POTENTIAL revenue stream. 7 years later we did 80K gross income in our dining room in the evenings and weekends. Even if I ever get tired of it being WORK I will never be without a vinyl cutter again in my life (if I have any choice in the matter.) WAY TOO MUCH FUN and the absolute first hobby I have ever had that actually MAKES money instead of costing. I still do lots of freebie funs stuff for friends and family which is why I bought the stuff in the first place. 

Dining room table..sounds familiar!! Lol. Do you sell online or in person?

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8 hours ago, Keeley said:

Dining room table..sounds familiar!! Lol. Do you sell online or in person?

No online. I mostly do apparel these days with an occasional vehicle graphic. I have a full time day job managing a construction company which keeps my daytime hours full so the vehicle and sign work doesn't fit very well where apparel you can work on at all hours. My wife does a lot of the actual shirt builds during the day while I'm off slaying dragons, she's an awesome partner who has grown comfortable with working the heat press and embroidery machine. My biggest clients are in the construction industry and are people I have known for years and years. When I first bought my equipment I happened to come into one of the stores that I do a lot of construction business with and they were looking over a t-shirt that they had built and weren't happy with the quality of the work. I told them I do that sort of thing on the side so I snapped a pic of the design and went home and rebuilt one with HTV and dropped it off the next day. Instant client. Word spread and soon I was doing a whole host of construction hoodies and safety green/orange work apparel. I also have several daughters heavily into club volleyball and that side of things is also big business a couple times a year building uniforms. Softball too. 

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Did you actually get into the world of selling decals? I have been thinking about doing the same thing, however I am kind of afraid, especially taking into account the situation that we are having nowadays, the pandemic and so on and so forth. I actually think that this kind of business might actually be way too risky and unstable becasue all of the things happening right now. I am actually thinking about setting up my own website, which looks to be .. better idea. I am thinking about calling for the services of digiscorp in order to help me into my new beginning.

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