Hi everyone and welcome to another article. Today I’m going to show you how you can start your own brand with zero dollars whether you sell one product or 1000 products it only depends on your will and ambition.
I’m going to unveil today’s article, I’m going to do digital printing with embroidery on Printful.
Let’s test it all out! First of all what I did I ordered a T-shirt and a Bob you can see them on my store here : saczigsac
So to start it’s very simple I connected Printful to my Shopify store it’s completely free and easy to configure of course there are paid options but honestly you don’t really need!
The process is simple, if you’ve heard of dropshipping you can read one of our articles here : Dropshipping or DropshippingReview you won’t be confused. Someone places an order on your site and you order for your customer on Printful.
Printful will manufacture it and send it to the customer from their factory in the USA, Spain or Portugal, not far from your customer’s location anyway, which reduces the delivery time. What I did, I ordered like on Saturday, on Thursday I had already received the sample products.
What is print on demand dropshipping and what are the pros and cons of this business model?
Many people who have just started or want to start an e-commerce business are asking “What is print on demand? How does it work? Is it worth it? And isn’t it better to print and ship your products yourself?” If you read this article to the end, you’ll learn step by step how print on demand dropshipping works and why it’s a good way to start an online business. We will see its main advantages, to see how to get the most out of it, and its main disadvantages to see how to avoid them. If you find what you read interesting, subscribe to our newsletters! Every time we publish a new article and don’t miss any of our tips to start a profitable online business! To answer this question, let’s first have a quick look at what dropshipping is, again you can read our articles on this issue.
I propose you a small definition:
Dropshipping is a business model in which a seller offers to his customers products manufactured or marketed by a third party supplier. This third party supplier delivers the products directly to the seller’s customers. It can be either the resale of finished (non-customized) products, as for example reselling Aliexpress products. Or customized products under your brand, with your own printed or embroidered designs. If the products are customized, this is called print on demand.
This is called “on demand” production, because your custom designs are printed on the products ONLY when your customers order them. To better understand how print on demand works, let’s use Printful as an example. To get started with print on demand with Printful, all you have to do is register for free on the site and connect your online store to Printful. This can be a store created on platforms like Shopify, Woocommerce, Squarespace, or a seller account on a marketplace like Etsy, Ebay, or Amazon. Then, you choose the products you want to sell from Printful’s catalog, create or import your designs, set your profit margins, and wait for orders to come in. When you receive an order, Printful customizes the products with your print, embroidery or other designs, packages them, and delivers them directly to your customers.
Importantly, no logo was found on the packaging sent to me with the products I ordered! Read More Here
It allows you to start your own business or brand online, without having to buy products in bulk, or invest in equipment or staff. You won’t have to pay for your products in advance, store them, or manage their delivery.
You can run your business from anywhere, all you need is a computer and an internet connection! Print on demand is an ideal solution for those who are just starting out and don’t have the means to make large investments. With Printful, there are no sign-up fees or monthly fees. You may have to pay for hosting your site, for using an e-commerce platform, or for paid advertising to promote your store. But it’s still a very cost-effective solution compared to other business models.
Starting a print on demand business doesn’t involve much risk. You can maintain and even grow your business with a very small budget. It’s also a great way to grow a business, experiment, test new products and ideas. It’s a great business model for entrepreneurs and artists who want to sell their work on different products, whether it’s prints of their artwork or quotes printed on mugs. If you already have an online business or a brand, print on demand is also a great way to earn passive income, selling merchandise. Customized merchandise has become a real source of income, not only for YouTubers and influencers, but also for companies, associations and freelancers who gather a community around their activity.
In short, print on demand can be a great way for you to start an online business, to first earn extra income, and why not one day dedicate yourself to it full time.
Now let’s get down to business and look at the main pros and cons of this model:
One – You don’t have to have wholesale printing, your products are made “on demand in units” only when a customer orders them. This prevents you from being left with a huge inventory of unsold products if one of your designs doesn’t sell as well as expected.
Two – You don’t have to buy any equipment. Printful takes care of customizing your products with printing, embroidery and engraving to suit the product.
Three – Printful takes the hassle out of running a business. It takes care of the fulfillment, packaging and delivery of your orders, while you focus on your designs and marketing strategy.
Four – You can test new designs and take more risks. Printful makes it easy to add new product designs to your store, and see if your customers like them or not. Since products are printed on demand, there’s no need to invest in designs or products that might not sell. If a design or product is not as popular as expected, you can easily remove it from your store.
Five – You have a wide range of products to sell. Printful goes beyond just printing. They have embroidery products like hats and apparel, engraved jewelry, “all over” items with your design printed all over them, like leggings, dresses, backpacks, fanny packs, and any other product you can imagine.
You can create your own collections of clothing for different audiences. For example, you can create a collection with tops, shorts, leggings and sports bras for fitness enthusiasts. A collection for the beach with custom swimsuits, towels and beach bags. Or even a personalized baby collection with bodysuits, leggings or bibs.
Six – You can offer more customization options to your customers. For example, offer to incorporate something unique into the design, like their name. One of the goals is to meet a growing need for personalization in the customer’s shopping experience. In fact, they have created a product customization tool available for certain integrations.
This tool allows you to sell products that your customers can customize directly on your store, without you having to manually edit them, yourself, every time.
Seven – You can easily create your brand. Print on demand services all have one thing in common: they’re white label. That means you can customize your products and packaging with your own logo and branding, without any sign that the product came from a third-party service.
For example, with Printful you have different personalization options. You can create custom interior or exterior labels with your logo on them, customize your packing slips, or add packaging inserts (like stickers or thank you notes to give your packages a personal touch).
Eight – You have many services and resources at your disposal. Working with a print on demand service is a partnership of sorts.
Your success as a vendor is a shared success with Printful. You can count on Printful to not only handle your orders, but also to help you get started and grow your business with a number of resources. The Printful website and their social networks are full of tips. It also has blogs, an ebook to help you set up your store, videos, etc.
But as with everything, there are also some drawbacks to the print on demand model:
One – You don’t have control over the customization and quality of the products sent to your keys. As with any dropshipping service, in print on demand you do not see the products until they are delivered to your customers. You have to trust your supplier.
That’s why it’s important to test your designs and products before you start selling them to see what they look like. With Printful, as I explain at the top of this article, it’s very easy: you have the option of ordering product samples at a discount. It is possible that you or your customer will receive a damaged product. It could be a manufacturer’s error, an error during customization or an accident during the shipping of the order. These things happen in every business. As you may already know, all products made by Printful go through a quality control process. But as with everything, it is possible for Printful to accidentally let a defective product go through. If your customer receives a defective or damaged product due to an error on Printful’s part, Printful takes full responsibility and will offer you a refund.
Two – You are dependent on your supplier or print partner and the availability of their inventory. Printful works with various suppliers to source products or materials, such as fabric. So sometimes products are out of stock or unavailable. With Printful, you can check product availability and prices on the various product pages in the catalog. Just click on the product in question and check its availability – it’s that easy!
Three – Order processing takes longer. Because each product is customized with your designs on demand, order processing takes longer than if you had ready-made products in stock. Our average order processing time is 3 days, plus shipping time. For my own products, a delay of one week from the order to the reception is very correct for a personalized product.
A word of advice, you should inform your customers and let them know that each product is printed on demand and that it takes a little longer than sending a ready made product. Customers usually understand and accept that it takes longer for a custom product.
Four – Managing returns may require more attention on your part. Since you are working with a third party service, there are more things to consider if your customers want to return a product. One tip Establish a return policy that aligns with Printful’s. In general, there are two types of returns: returns made by the carrier and returns made by customers. In the first case, when your package is returned by a carrier, it is often due to a “shipping address error. This happens if you or your customer provides an address that the carrier considers incomplete.
So ask your customers to be very careful with postal codes and apartment numbers, to avoid any delay in the delivery of their orders.
The second case, when the customer wants to return an item, is often because they ordered the wrong size. To avoid this situation, Printful strongly suggests adding a size guide to your product pages. There is a very comprehensive blog post on terms and conditions that you should add to your site to help manage returns. I strongly encourage you to read it,
Our conclusion on the subject;
Print on demand is ideal for starting an online business because of its low cost and minimal risk factors. It can save you time since you won’t have to deal with production or package management.
Besides, Printful is constantly adding new products and customization options, and making it easy to manage your business. But as with anything, there are drawbacks, such as having to trust a supplier to ensure the best possible quality, and being dependent on their selection of available products. With print on demand, also remember that because your orders are processed on demand, you need to consider product processing time when giving estimates to your customers. With more and more consumers shopping online, it makes sense that e-commerce is one of the fastest growing industries. And by now, you know, print on demand is a great way to get started in online sales.
If I forgot to mention any advantage or disadvantage of print on demand, let me know in comments! Also, feel free to suggest topics you’d like us to cover in our articles! Ciao and see you in the next article!
PRINTFUL YOUR DAY
