Design Time?

Earl Smith · February 9th, 2011, 11:48 AM

How long does it take to make a design for a DTG machine and do you charge the customer for this time?
When printing with vinyl , one or two colours, the design takes 5 to 10 mins max. Maybe a little longer if the logo is complicated. Generally not too long and for this service I dont make an extra charge to the customer for doing it. In Embroidery its established that the customer pays for digitising.
But with DTG what is the norm?
One of the biggest advantage of the DTG is its ability to print just one piece. But to make an "arty" design worthy of the DTG need time to do it. How long on average would you need to make a DTG design?
Lets say its for a car club or a bowling club . Just to get an idea of how much time and therefore cost I will need to build into my pricing.
Maybe Im asking how long is a piece of string but I am very near to buying a DTG but I need to know the "real" costs.
Any thought will be helpful.

Earl

Eric · February 10th, 2011, 03:49 PM

Hey Earl,

OK, so here goes ...

Generally, DTG's are crudely put, click and print, ok, yes, you do need RIP software if you are getting one that prints with white ink, but that comes with ANY dark garment capable printer.

Generally most "one-off" shirts we do are custom, and most of them are not complicated, just text, or a picture, etc. We don't charge artwork on those things, cause its is just Scan or type and done. Litte/No setiup time. However, if it IS a custom design, then yes we do charge. Like if they want us to create a logo, or a big design for a sports team, or an event, then yes, we charge an artwork fee, we charge by the design, and how complicated it is. We have a stock library of templates that we can show customers and if all we need to do is change a few colors and add some text that most of the time we either don't charge them or charge them very little. We use our judgement.

However, most people that enter our shop for one or two t-shirts don't have anything majorly fancy in mind.

DTG has been a really big thing for us lately. What brand of DTG are you looking at buying? We have an Anajet in the front of our shop that does the simple things and the while you wait stuff. People like to watch it. We have a Kornit in our production area for the high volume or large image size stuff.

Let me know if you have any other Questions.

-- Eric

Eric · February 10th, 2011, 03:51 PM

Costs ... whoops, forgot about that one.

It varies greatly. White ink is very expensive, and you need to pretreat the shirts which is an added cost. Generally for a large color print on a dark shirt, the total TRUE cost to print is about $1.50ish for a small image, and $2.50-$3.00 for a large image. This is on our Anajet.

Our Kornit is MUCH cheaper. We can print full color shirts on it for about $1 all day.

Earl Smith · February 11th, 2011, 04:54 AM

Thanks Eric, always full of useful information.
When I see these printers at fairs and so on they are always printing fabulous , multi coloured designs. These designs , I am sure , I will hang on my shop wall to attract customers. But , it has always puzzled me how long it takes to do the design before it gets to the printer. Hence the reason for this post.
You said that you have "stock designs" to show your customers. Are these designs available to buy or have they been done by yourselves? Something like that would be very useful to help get my DTG business started.
Costs of printing? I figured about what you said and I have calculated 3€ as a standard cost.
The printer I am looking at is the Neotex. ( I hope you didnt go "Oh no" when you saw that). They seem very helpful and interested in their customers. This I have seen from the other t-shirt forum. I will be seeing the Neo next week and if I like it and the offer they are making then I will sign on the dotted line.

Thanks again
Earl

Earl Smith · February 11th, 2011, 12:46 PM

I should also ask. What do you think of the Neotex?
Interesting to hear your thoughts.
Earl

Eric · February 12th, 2011, 03:50 PM

I have never head of NeoTex. However, when buying a DTG, here are a few things to look & look out for.

The biggest one:
A "sealed ink" delivery system. Meaning, the printer uses cartridges and not "tanks" The cartridges are vacuum sealed, and the printer is "pressurized" this helps drastically reduce head clogging, as no air gets at the ink. With the bottles or "tanks" is is like leaving the lid off a can of paint. It will dry out much quicker.

Make sure you can control the baser layers, and see if they have what is called a "content based" white ink feature, this will help reduce your cost of white ink. What it does is, when printing on dark garments it lowers the amount of white ink placed under dark colors, like blues, grey, greens, etc. and increases the white ink under the brighter colors, yellows, reds, and so on. while this is not 100% necessary, it will save you some money in the long run.

You can find lots of stock designs at places like:

www.rivalart.com
www.actionartclub.com
www.greatdanegraphics.com

All 3 of the above have tons of graphics at varying prices. Start with action, they have the cheapest art, but require a subscription to download.

Rival & Great dane are good if you just need a quick "one and run"

Let me know if you have any other questions.

fatkat printz · February 13th, 2011, 04:35 AM

I think he means NeoFlex by All American Supply

http://www.neoflexprinter.com/

Earl Smith · February 14th, 2011, 04:31 AM

Correct Mr Fatkatz it is the http://www.neoflexprinter.com/ I knew Id given it the wrong name the moment I sent the post in. It looks like a good machine and the manufacturer seems on the ball. If something goes wrong he wants to know and will do his best to fix it. I know someone with one of these printers and he is very happy with it and the service. Neo have recently brought out a new Rip software that does what you say Eric. Only printing white where its needed.
I am seening the printer "in Action" this week. They have a good offer on for it and I am interested. It will be a big step for me as these machines are like starting a new business within my business. But it will open up a whole new area of customer for me. I am excited but cautious. For the same money I could buy another single head Barudan and have change left over.
Thanks for the links Eric.
Earl.

Earl Smith · February 22nd, 2011, 05:29 AM

Update on my Neoflex visit.
Very good printer, perfect prints, timed system built in to circulate the white ink and help stop clogging. Easy to use Rip software. Really helpful people selling the machine. Neo seems to believe that customer service is top priority and what Ive heard from other users of the machine, they are good to their word.
Only stumbling block for me is getting credit. In Europe it is not so easy to get credit as in the US, allegedly. They dont look at the potential to earn from the machine and therefore pay for it, they look at ability to pay from what I make now. And the printer costs nearly 40% more here than in the States. ( $25,900 as opposed to $18,500).
We will see.
Earl

nametags · February 22nd, 2011, 09:02 AM

Are ink costs high with the Neoflex? Higher than others. Hadn't heard of this brand, I'll look into it.
Any other users of this machine out there. I'd love to hear your comments or provide you with my email so I could as a few questions if you don't mind.