Starting a screen printing business... Must knows? Helpful Knowledge?

[crobinson524]

Hi,  I am just looking to start up a screen printing business.  My buddies friend started one up and he seems to love it so Im going to give it a shot.   I am currently a seasonal firefighter so on my off time I want to start my own business and something I can stay busy with.   Im very new to all this and still learning a lot.  Any info will be helpful so can people share their knowledge and maybe some do's and don'ts or what to look out for when starting?  What is a good beginning screen printing machine to start on?  type of dryer to use? Ink to buy?   How big of an area do I need?   Info like that  I would really appreciate it
and if you have some real good info feel free to email me please.
thank you,
crobinson524@yahoo.com

[Frog]

First off , welcome.
So, can you visit your buddie's friend's shop? That may be a start to see what he needs and how much room it takes.

I work on residential property, and have a detached shop about 450 square feet. A bathroom that I had to pretty much dedicate to wet-work, and give up a bedroom in the house for art.
I also have an office and reception area, but you may not even want to deal face to face with custies, so that may not be necessary.

Good advice is to work hands on in a shop. That's probably not going to happen with you having another job, but you may want to put aside a weekend or two and take some classes.

How much do you plan to spend to get the business started?

And, if someone has "some real good info", we here certainly hope that they post it rather than just email you.
This is a forum after all, and exists as a knowledge base for all who will follow. In fact, if you read through a lot of old posts each day, many of your questions may be answered as others asked the same thing. I always recommend that folks new to the forum and industry set aside 30 minutes or so each day to just read, read, read.

Youtube and other sites also can be great resources for you, but there is also plenty of "the blind leading the blind"  as the internet has no requirements of actual quality or fact.
I suspect that others here will chime in with specific recommendations.

[ryanmoor]

Welcome to screen printing, or almost Its a great gig for firefighters on the side, you have a lot of connections, a good schedule you can work with, and have a great work ethic to get where you are. I agree with Frog on youtube Catspit has some great videos as well as others. I think the best advice is to get hands on with it before you get equipment, either spend some time in your buddies shop, take a class, or a combination of the two, this is also a great place for resources and knowledge! Also if you have a chance to get to a tradeshow, there are some good ones coming up in Arlington, Atlantic City, Chicago, and Indy.  Best of luck

[crobinson524]

Yeah, Im definitely going to try and set something up to go visit his shop and hopefully he can show me some good stuff.  Supposedly he just got a new press.... "Work horse with 8 stations fully automatic press ran by a tablet"  thats what my buddy texted me. Thanks for the info, I'm heading to youtube for an hour before bed to learn some stuff then tomorrow ill look into any classes close to me!   I plan on starting small so not trying to spend too much money at first but then eventually growing and possibly doing screen printing full time. I have a lot of connections as @ryanmoor was saying. Also my pops has a newspaper ad business and I can have him throw an ad for me in there.   

ohhh definitely am going to look up trade shows I'd get a lot of knowledge from that. 

[Lizard]

I would recommend you find a really good contract printer in your area.  That would allow you to sell print jobs of all sizes and quality levels while learning the business with no fixed expenses.  Once you know all the ins and outs of the trade and still have the desire to get your hands dirty you can set up shop and still have a go to source for the larger/more difficult jobs.

[blue moon]

I would recommend you find a really good contract printer in your area.  That would allow you to sell print jobs of all sizes and quality levels while learning the business with no fixed expenses.  Once you know all the ins and outs of the trade and still have the desire to get your hands dirty you can set up shop and still have a go to source for the larger/more difficult jobs.

THIS!

Core of every business is sales. If you are thinking you can buy the press, start printing and you'll be making money, you are in for a rude awakening! In order to make money you need to sell. This means making it the focus of your business and all the actions you take. Think about all the stories of somebody who can cook opening a restaurant and then going out of business for lack of customers. Don't be that guy!

As Lizard said, find a contract printer (local would be better) and start selling. Have the printer (or even you friend) do the work while you learn the business. If you decide to stick with it, bring the printing in house.

If you are just interested in printing, contact the local shops, many of them are looking for help in the upcoming summer season.

pierre

[jvanick]

Can't stress the 'sales' aspect enough.

I started printing for my band... we just wanted to produce shirts to give away for free at our shows, and I have VERY little sales skills (or customer service skills, but that's a whole different story).

Tiffany saw what I was doing, and started selling it to other people.. now we have a decent sized shop.

Without her sales skills, I'd be still printing on a 1 color press in the basement.

You're going to need to find a good contract printer in your area anyways, as there will be orders that are too complex or too large for you to handle day 1, so start there.

For the must-knows, I HIGHLY recommend taking a good class, SGIA's 1 week class is excellent, and covers all aspects, and is VERY hands on.  Some of the 2 day classes are very decent, but they don't dive deep enough into some of the more important parts of printing.

There's a saying which I didn't believe at first, but now I truly agree with...

How do you make a million dollars in screen printing?  Start with 2.

[mooseman]

think about this.......
starting a business is like walking into a casino it is a gamble.
If you are smart never go into a casino or start out investing more in a business with more $$$$$$ than you can afford to lose.
evaluate the risk and don't fool yourself on the return
expect to work hard, study the market and the process, adapt a product and work against the wind just to stay in the game.
Visit the shop you mentioned but remember like a gambler we all tend to talk about the wins and forget about the expense committed to get those wins.
You can make good $ printing shirts.
you can have a real good setup with decent to very nice manual equipment all around for about 10K,
you can jump in the business , equipment wise, for about 5K but if your business works at all you will be looking at the 10K or better upgrade  in no time so if you can start out with better equipment, press dryer, screens, as a minimum.
nice manual presses are about $1,000.00 per station new
nice dryers capable of handling the output from a decent manual are about $3,000.00 new
opening bids on about a dozen or a few more screens say roller frames with mesh about $700 - $1000.00
flash dryer @ $800 - 1000 new
startup chemicals $700.00
operating equipment like squeegees, pressure washers , wash out facility @ $1500.00 +
startup inks another $700- 1000.00 depending
other stuff you don't know you need but will end up buying $1200.00 to $3000.00 , examples art programs, printers , films, drying boxes for screens, storage racks/ cabinets for exposed screens, clip art, 

so the bottom line for nice equipment buying new with a 4 station / 4 color press you could be looking at $12,000 on the short side. If this is way above your budget you are fighting a big fire with a garden hose
On one hand this is a lot of money......on the other hand it is pocket change in terms of starting a business that could return you 3 times the investment in the first year with the expectation of reasonable success.

THIS IS YOUR BIG PROBLEM...........One of your drawbacks is you are going to be SEASONAL....if your fire fighting duties require your attention at the same time the tee shirt market heats up find another business. The tee shirt market is seasonal by most accounts especially for the little guys printing 12 to 24 shirt jobs. like fighting a fire you can't do it from a great distance, you have to be in the heat , so if the seasons happen fall at the same time you should rethink the idea. Your tee shirt shop connection I am guessing is in your area so will be a good indicator of when there is a market for you to sell into. Also it will take you about one solid year to really get going with customers , ability, recovery from mistakes and mis-starts etc. If you chop this up into 4-6 month segments broken up by your fire fighting duties you may never recover your investment. Screen printing takes a lot of time and effort

best of luck.... buy the best equipment you can starting out....work like hell to learn and develop your product
mooseman

[im_mcguire]

There is some great info already here, but Ill add my .02

One thing I always tell people who want to start learning screen printing as a hobby, or business, is to expect to fail at a few things for awhile.  Not everything is going to be perfect the first time you do it. 
When I first started, I thought it would be easy.  Boy was I wrong.  I had thrown a lot of money around with trial and error (more so on the error) because I was doing it all by myself, and learning from youtube videos.

There was a lot of frustration, messed up jobs, and times I thought I wanted to quit.  I didnt have someone close that I knew that I could learn from, so I learned by my mistakes.  And I dont think that is ever a bad thing.

But once I saw one of my first client's face when I printed a 2 color job for a family reunion, I knew that all of the hard work was worth it.

Keep at it, and always be willing to learn.  I work with a couple offset printers that dont take kindly to someone trying to give them advice.  But just know, the industry is always changing, and there is always something to learn.

This is a great board to learn, and ask questions.  Good luck on your endeavors!!!

[Frog]

I also should suggest, that it always blows my mind when a newbie comes on a forum and asks how to do something quite sophisticated and/or complicated and difficult.
Baby steps.
One dark color on light shirts.
One light color on dark shirts.
Two colors on light
Two colors on dark...

...and so on

[blue moon]

and stay away from Catspit videos! Rayonet has stuff on Youtube that is much closer to the right way of doing things. They still miss here and there, but it can be used to get started. It would not hurt to double check here on any information gained from videos. And along those notes, it would not hurt to take our info with a grain of salt too! It is the most correct information available in one place at one time, but there is another level beyond what is discussed here. . .

pierre

[blue moon]

think about this.......
starting a business is like walking into a casino it is a gamble.
If you are smart never go into a casino or start out investing more in a business with more $$$$$$ than you can afford to lose.
evaluate the risk and don't fool yourself on the return
expect to work hard, study the market and the process, adapt a product and work against the wind just to stay in the game.
Visit the shop you mentioned but remember like a gambler we all tend to talk about the wins and forget about the expense committed to get those wins.
You can make good $ printing shirts.
you can have a real good setup with decent to very nice manual equipment all around for about 10K,
you can jump in the business , equipment wise, for about 5K but if your business works at all you will be looking at the 10K or better upgrade  in no time so if you can start out with better equipment, press dryer, screens, as a minimum.
nice manual presses are about $1,000.00 per station new
nice dryers capable of handling the output from a decent manual are about $3,000.00 new
opening bids on about a dozen or a few more screens say roller frames with mesh about $700 - $1000.00
flash dryer @ $800 - 1000 new
startup chemicals $700.00
operating equipment like squeegees, pressure washers , wash out facility @ $1500.00 +
startup inks another $700- 1000.00 depending
other stuff you don't know you need but will end up buying $1200.00 to $3000.00 , examples art programs, printers , films, drying boxes for screens, storage racks/ cabinets for exposed screens, clip art, 

so the bottom line for nice equipment buying new with a 4 station / 4 color press you could be looking at $12,000 on the short side. If this is way above your budget you are fighting a big fire with a garden hose
On one hand this is a lot of money......on the other hand it is pocket change in terms of starting a business that could return you 3 times the investment in the first year with the expectation of reasonable success.

THIS IS YOUR BIG PROBLEM...........One of your drawbacks is you are going to be SEASONAL....if your fire fighting duties require your attention at the same time the tee shirt market heats up find another business. The tee shirt market is seasonal by most accounts especially for the little guys printing 12 to 24 shirt jobs. like fighting a fire you can't do it from a great distance, you have to be in the heat , so if the seasons happen fall at the same time you should rethink the idea. Your tee shirt shop connection I am guessing is in your area so will be a good indicator of when there is a market for you to sell into. Also it will take you about one solid year to really get going with customers , ability, recovery from mistakes and mis-starts etc. If you chop this up into 4-6 month segments broken up by your fire fighting duties you may never recover your investment. Screen printing takes a lot of time and effort

best of luck.... buy the best equipment you can starting out....work like hell to learn and develop your product
mooseman

thanx Moosman! That is a great post! With good shopping some of the stuff can probably be had a little cheaper (especially if buying used which in general is not a good idea for somebody with no experience), but right on the money (pun intended) with the info.

pierre

[crobinson524]

Damn a lot of helpful information.   I honestly didn't think this site would help but I'm extremely glad I came across it. All this is info is really helpful, and I think the best thing for me to do is get some hands on in a shop and learn the business before I take my next step. You guy are all right and my first thought was "easy money"  but Im going to have to work my butt off and its best to learn from other people before I just jump into it and start counting down the numbers in my bank account haha !   again thank you all for all the info and keep it coming 

[244]

Damn a lot of helpful information.   I honestly didn't think this site would help but I'm extremely glad I came across it. All this is info is really helpful, and I think the best thing for me to do is get some hands on in a shop and learn the business before I take my next step. You guy are all right and my first thought was "easy money"  but Im going to have to work my butt off and its best to learn from other people before I just jump into it and start counting down the numbers in my bank account haha !   again thank you all for all the info and keep it coming 

Don't know where you are located but if you are near the Chicago land area we here at M&R have a training facility available with machines to learn proper printing and screen making procedures.

[Frog]

crobinson is in Sacramento CA