eashonk

If the shirts are black or another dark color that will effect price, also whether the shirts are 50/50 and what color is the print to be, any color on a dark garment will require an underbase

You should bill her direct and treat her as the client, if she resells the end product and charges them for graphics, that's her business. If anything is wrong at that point it is her problem, not yours. She is the graphic artist, so she should be able to work any color issues with you. You should also insist that you print a small maybe 6" x 12" color proof for her to show the client before you print anything for her and maker her sign off on that proof in case she fails to show the end client. I would give her a break on the printing since she obviously is bringing you work, but let her know your prices are firm and that she is going to have to consider that when pricing jobs in the future. It sounds like she is quoting jobs without considering the true cost of the end product to produce. I think that would be a better deal for both of you, you can train her to deliver what you need, plus she is like an outside salesperson you don't have to pay or babysit, she doesn't run the risk of you cutting her out by contacting her clients directly.

Anything's possible. It's completely possible this is all just a dream.

Dude, you are breaking the law. You might as well be selling cocaine, check out the fines: https://www.lib.purdue.edu/uco/CopyrightBasics/penalties.html http://supolicies.syr.edu/docs/alcohol_penalties_federal.pdf Secondly, watching someone else break the law isn't an excuse to do it yourself is it? Larger companies may not be "caught" as you put it, because they have either gone through the proper channels and received licensing agreements to reproduce the logos or they are simply better at hiding like maybe not naming their item by the copyright holder's name (ie adidas widget). Secondly, you just got a letter, who's to say that the other companies didn't get the same letter and are just ignoring it, or maybe there's a pending lawsuit you don't know about, which would take longer than sending a letter. So, all in all, you're just being immature, you did something wrong, you got caught and now you feel singled out so you're trying to justify your actions by stating that "everyone else is doing it". A copyright judge wouldn't buy that and neither do I. So, once again, don't be a dunce.

I would be very concerned about the fact that it was paypal and not e-bay that is stopping you because that means that they probably have access to your sales and banking transactions with paypal which could mean that they are getting ready to launch a law suit. It's pretty dumb to blatantly sell trademarked or violate a copyright on the internet, especially e-bay and especially using pay-pal where all the transactions are tracked. If you're going to break the law a strictly cash no advertising policy is the way to go you dunce.

Well, if they're losing money just wait them out until they go bankrupt and buy all their inventory and equipment at auction prices. That's how I got most of my stuff. And yes, this happens all over place since the cost and learning curve to enter the industry is fairly small there are plenty of fly by night operations that crop up and then go out of business shortly after. For that reason, most people who get into this business are just not good business people and therefore don't last long. I stopped buying new equipment several years ago, there's plenty on craigslist and e-bay.

My name is Allan, I own a company called Studio413. You can find me on facebook at ShopStudio413. I do custom t-shirts as well as vinyl and sublimation graphics. I have a degree in graphic arts and just bought out another company this year and started working full time in my business. Check out my stuff and feel free to contact me with specifics and I can get you a quote. I will need to know shirt sizes and quantities, how many print colors and locations.

I started a topic below in the Buy sell trade section, a lot of the stuff has sold so I want to delete it and create a new topic for what is left, how do I do that?

I like to get the most that I can out of every job and focus on quality rather than what the dude down the street is doing. In my experience the people who undercut every job you do are usually stressed out because they aren't making any money, try to cut corners, make mistakes and eventually go out of business. Then I swoop in and buy all their surpluss materials and equipmentment on the cheap and wait for the next guy to come along and try to undercut me.

I have done those types of signs before. What you want to do is print that part on outdoor suitable vinyl in a solvent ink based printer, laminate it and stick it to it. Do any other text he wants in vinyl, but the graphic and text around it should be printed. As stated above, a clean digital copy can be gotten, so it shouldn't be problem to print clean. Also, you can get a lot more than $500 bucks if you install the sign on sight for him. For instance, you can set the posts in concrete and install the sign in a vinyl sign post system and even light it up. Don't waste your time digitizing, converting, cutting, weeding, taping, etc. Just not necessary and it won't be appreciated because it isn't what the customer really requires. Put your time into something that the customer will value and pay for such as the example above. It will make you more money and the customer will be happier because he is getting value where he wants it, not just because you are limited in your production capabilities. I'm sure someone on here would jump at the chance to print it for you at wholesale price as well. Also, as a side note, yes you can get that stuff from Grimco at that price, but don't forget about freight. They don't ship stuff that size by UPS, so you are going to be better off buying several sheets, even if you are close enough to drive and pick it up from either Chicago or St. Louis. The last time I had 25 sheets of PVC that size shipped to me by freight it was $350.

sounds indicitive of old vinyl, if it sits around too long the glue loses it's tack and the plastic hardens causing it to crack, might try getting a newer roll and see if the same thing happens

i wrote a program in compucal which is basically the open office version of excell which lets me customize markups and breaks down profit margins, for everything else you mention i use off the shelf software such as quicken, but any of these will work, it's not rocket science

In the t-shirt business I've found that it is mostly go big or go home. If you are trying to keep inventory on hand for those 1-10 shirt orders you're never going to make $ because all of your profits are always going to be tied up in trying to keep stock just in case someone comes in wanting 5 shirts by tomorrow. In my opinion, that's not really worth my time, so if someone wants something like that, I send them down the road to the other guy. I only do the high profit jobs in the time frame that suits my business. Rushing things only ends up with dissapointed customers and a small bank account. I am alost completely out of the t-shirt part of the business and may not ever really get back into it. It is just too involved to be doing it out of my house. Too many chemicals, to many things can go wrong with screens. Unless I'm doing a larger order, it just isn't worth it.

Well, not really, it is WRONG. Granted, it is rediculous for a company to come after an individual and costing them large sums of $, possibly bankrupting them just to make an example. However, it is not wrong for them to go after people trying to make $ or even just creating a 1 off shirt for themselves. I myself am a graphic artist that has had my designs ripped off hundreds of times. Every day I see stuff I know I designed repurposed for different team, and when I ask who made them, it is never the company that I had worked for at the time (even that bothers me, even though they do own the designs since I worked for them at the time) but it really irks me to see my stuff stepped all over and compromised by lesser "artists" (*who didn't go to school, who flood the market with underwhelming talent in my field, who don't have student loans to pay, and are the sole reason I can't get a design job at a t-shirt company around here for more than $12 an hour.) So, yes, you wanna be professional artists, it is wrong to take my work and repurpose it for fun or profit, I can't afford to sue you, so please stop.

yeah, you should outsource it to a screen printer, you will make more money, the overall job will be cheaper for your customer, and you won't have to do anything, just collect $ for instance, a 1 color single location screenprint quantity 100 would average just around 5.50 per shirt in my area, no way I'd pay $12 a shirt if I was buying 100. Maybe if it was like 3 color back 1 color front $12 would be reasonable. But, for that price, all you're going to do is tick off your customer when they do some calling around. *FYI 100 t-shirts isn't really a huuuge order, when you're talking 500-1000, that's more like it, in t-shirts that is. The average order for screen printers is 50 or more. It kind of depends on the market niche they are in, but that's about what I saw in the shops I've worked at.