Tips and Tricks for T-shirt Entrepreneurs

Base Price Increases - 1st Printfection now CafePress

Posted on June 25th, 2008 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: CafePress, Print on Demand.

Well first POD newcomer, Printfection, announced a price raise. Now CafePress has followed.
Printfection’s increase is the first they’ve had (though of course they haven’t been around that long yet, less than 5 years). CafePress’s increase is the first in 9 years. Printfection says they are increasing prices around 10% across the board while CafePress has varied increases on select items, including the popular White T-shirt. Printfection has also increased its second side printing fee from $2 to $3.
Can we say gas price increases? Neither company specifically says that’s the reason, though CafePress mentions “Margins” which would include that. Printfection makes a point to say that they are absorbing shipping costs for shipping out to customers but they don’t mention an increased cost in wholesalers shipping items out to them which I imagine has happened.
The “Good” news: As a shopkeeper on either system you don’t have to do anything on your end, retail costs will just jump up accordingly. If you want to shave off some of your mark up then you will need to adjust prices on your own.

On CafePress’s end, a small comment caught my eye, some of the price increases will be due to product upgrades. They specifically mentioned journals will get a lined paper choice. I like that idea.

So yeah, I’m stretching to see the “Good” in price increases but these days what can you do?

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eBay and your PoD shop - Making Auctions Do Double Duty

Posted on December 9th, 2007 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Marketing, Print on Demand.

I was an eBay seller before I was a CafePress shopkeeper, not a serious seller, just a casual person selling things I owned.

Once I had a few CafePress shops I tried selling some of my CafePress items and didn’t do that well (broke even or didn’t sell the item). I didn’t have an eBay store set up though, I just did normal listings with non html descriptions so the auction presentation admittedly could’ve been a lot better. So in the end it was not really worth it in terms of sheer profit on an item when I still had to pay the base price for the item plus eBay fees.

However, I still occasionally list things on eBay because I think of my auctions more as an advertising expense than a pure profit generator. Here are my reasons why I think of them this way:

1. I mention my store in my About Me page

It is not OK with eBay to put your store link in the auction listing itself but you can add it to your About Me page. By the way, it is also not OK to say in your auction listing “Go to my About Me page for a link to my store”.

2. When I ship out an item I include a link to my store on the packing slip

I use PayPal to generate packing slips for me and I put my thanks and my store url in the area they provide for a note.

3. When I ship out an item I include a flier / catalog type page that promotes related items in my shop.

I’ve created a few versions of a single sheet flier that showcases different items in my shop. I include a coupon code when one is available.

What I haven’t done yet is include information about signing up for my shop’s newsletter. I should add that to the flier I think.

Note that the above methods work even if you are not auctioning off items you actually sell in your shop. I am auctioning off collectible figurines related to my store theme. Chances are if they like an X figurine they may like a t-shirt or sticker or hat, etc about X as well.

At any rate, I tend to use eBay when I can sell things in a batch (less post office trips) and/or when they have a special going on. For example right now they have a free Gallery option until December 12th.

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3 Presents and Tax Write Offs for the Internet Entrepreneur

Posted on November 18th, 2007 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Deals, General Business.

So the Holiday Season is upon us. Time for thanks and cheer and presents… and your last chance for getting business expenses for the calendar year.

I thought I’d share three things I think are great expenses for this year.

1. Canon Digital Rebel XTi 10.1MP Digital SLR Camera - I purchased this just a few months ago to use for my freelance design work, my photography sites, and to use for product and model shots for use in my shops and blogs. I love it and wish I had gotten one sooner.

The picture above links to Amazon but it’s also available from NewEgg (one of my most trusted online electronic shops in terms of service, refunds, etc):
Canon Rebel XTI Black 10.1 MP Digital Camera - $669.99 at Newegg.com

If you can’t quite justify an SLR I offer you my second favorite camera
Canon PowerShot SD800 IS 7.1 Megapixel Digital ELPH Camera. Image stabilization is great and the Elph line is wonderful for its size and convenience.

2. Next on my list that I purchased this year (at a great rebate price) is my Palm 755p Dark Blue Smartphone (Sprint). I already owned a Treo 600 but upgraded to this when I discovered a much better phone plan which let me get this cheaply with a rebate. With the savings I made on switching plans I paid for this new phone in about two months.

My Treo has become a normal part of life for me now, the 755p was just a better upgrade from my 600 model: faster internet (faster than the iPhone) better camera, better screen resolution, more memory and processing speed.

One of the fabulous uses for my Treo is to be able to get internet access wherever I have a phone signal. I can get it on the phone itself or I can use bluetooth or the normal sync cord the Treo came with to get internet access for my laptop. No need to hunt for wifi. I’ve used it to work on my shops while out visiting family who don’t have broadband access (the Treo speed is faster than the dial up they got).

Palm(r) Treo(tm) 755p-Midnight Blue With world-class Palm ease and broadband-like speed. The Palm(r) Treo(tm) 755p smart device delivers everything you need in one go-anywhere, Palm OS(r) device. It combines a smarter phone with wireless email 1 , a built-in browser 1 , and rich media capabilities — all at blazing, broadband-like speeds 2 .

3. And to finish this list I’m adding in something I did not purchase but would like to have… a fantastic, inexpensive, lightweight, mini laptop, the ASUS Eee PC 4G Notebook PC (7″, 512 MB RAM), Pearl White. If you own a desktop machine and would like a laptop for travel I highly recommend this machine. As a traveler myself, when I bought a laptop (a Dell Inspiron 600m which is still going strong) I partly chose it for weight. I have not regretted that decision. However at less than 2 pounds, the Eee PC has my old Dell beat by over 3 pounds and by a lot in size which makes a difference when you’re lugging around that laptop bag plus other items.

The con is that it does not have the computing power nor memory or storage capacity as a regular sized laptop so I’m pretty sure that means no using Photoshop CS3 while out traveling. But if you run a web based business like a CafePress store, there is plenty of work you can do via the web alone. The machine reportedly starts up very quickly and comes loaded with a custom Linux variant and 40+ applications and has Open Office so you can do documents and spreadsheets etc. It also has a webcam and microphone, built in card reader and usb ports (which mean easy memory expansion).

And one of the best parts is that all this is $400 including software. Yep, $400 folks.

One of these plus a Treo would make a super lightweight, less-worry-about-theft, travel team. Or you can use this as a supplement to your desktop machine at home: work on your desktop but surf on the laptop.

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