Machine for Sewn in Labels

[Biverson]

We've got a client that we're going to do sewn in labels for on their sweatshirts. I've got a couple thousand coming up in the next couple months and was wondering what a good machine would be to do that? It'll be a simple straight line stitch and will only be there logo on the tag, not the COE, wash instructions, etc. I imagine a basic Brother sewing machine from Wal-mart would work fine, but I want to make sure I'm not overlooking anything and maybe get a specialty, feature packed one? Especially as I'm growing the contract side of things and don't want to have to buy twice later on down the road. For example, I could get a Singer for $200 - $300, or a higher end Juki or Janome for $500 - $1k.

[Dottonedan]

I think the key is having a high enough, open enough face so that you can rotate a large thick garment and still keep going. At the same time, you want it sturdy/heavy enough to stay in place on your table. We have one that sits on the table. No matter the price, That’s not great for what you want because it’s not bolted down. It rocks and can tip over. We paid about 200-300 for ours and is portable. Heavy, but portable. Not sure on exact price we paid.  So for what your talking about sweat shirts and/or jackets, it needs to be one that is mounted to a table.

[brandon]

Get a table mounted Juki with wheels preferably. Also a  needle position motor which controls the stop position of the needle. You will thank me. Especially if you are doing thousands. Whatever you buy at Walmart or whatever for $300 bucks is like printing manual vs an auto. Whatever you can do in a hour multiply it by 3 or 4 times. It is a huge difference

[zanegun08]

If just for sewing on labels efficiently, I'd spend the money up front and look into getting a bar tacker

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=korUqZyxZtM juki makes them too.

We don't have one right now, although we do have one that is a traditional machine with auto cutting which makes it much faster,

However a bartacker is the most efficient for sewing on labels, is set up ergonomically for it, and is super quick, but it just does one thing well, and so if you want something more versatile it isn't it.

We sew on hundreds of thousand labels, with all sort of shapes and sizes and locations, and have a Juki with auto cut, and some other industrial type traditional sewing machines, but I really want to get a bartacker as I bet it would be like twice as quick as the sit down models and would be easier to run for anyone, set the width, shuv in a hem with a label on it, line it up and hit sew and it sews and cuts and then do the next one.

[Biverson]

Thanks everyone. Right now I'm leaning towards the Juki DDL 9000C. It's around 2k but has a vast amount of functions, industrial, touch screen is easy, and it looks like it can easily be configured for neck tags, sleeve tags, and other specialty areas. The auto-tack looks nice too and the auto cut is really short. I like the ability set up stitch length as well. Haven't pulled the trigger yet tho.

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[ZooCity]

We use a Juki bartacker for sewing on clamshells.  Has some customized tooling on it.   Highly recommend.  These are very fast, accurate and even trim the thread for you.   If buying new you can get a good seller to set you up with the right tooling.

[ericheartsu]

We use a Juki bartacker for sewing on clamshells.  Has some customized tooling on it.   Highly recommend.  These are very fast, accurate and even trim the thread for you.   If buying new you can get a good seller to set you up with the right tooling.

i would LOVE LOVE LOVE to see some videos of this.

[Biverson]

Just wanted to give an update. LOVE the Juki DDL 9000C and glad I made the investment. It showed up and after an hour of watching videos and reading the manual I was able to create a custom profile for hoodies and stitch away. Anyone can do it. The auto tack feature with the auto cut is very speedy and I couldn't imagine doing it on a home machine. I could load, sew and unload hoodies at a consistent rate of 4/min, 240/hr. at $1.75/ea. isn't bad money and has already paid for itself. The next question is whether I left money on the table with my pricing, or was I high? The bar tack machines look quicker, but I needed something more versatile for possibly other sewing endeavors like sleeve and other labels.

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[zanegun08]

$1.75 to sew on a label!  That's $1.10 more than we charge!

If you can get it, charge it, that's like $420 an hour if you can keep up that speed consistently and have jobs with labels to sew on.

Also can make money on the labels if you provide them to you customers, it's a good upsell overall and adds a lot of value to the apparel in my opinion for what I tell people not much extra cost, but that would change if we charged $1.75 each to sew them on!

[Biverson]

You gotta' charge more! Haha. This was my first time ever quoting or doing sewn in labels so knowing how to price was definitely new. To screen print labels we'd be at $0.80/ea. for a 1-color print @ 300. "I" can print those 700/hr. if I'm loading. If my staff is loading 300-400/hr. The contract client I'm doing these for was using another provider previously just because they could do the sewn in labels. I guess something went awry with them and I'm doing all their hoodies now. That's the only product they do sewn in labels. I just quoted $1.75/ea. and they didn't say, "Hey, we were getting them done for $XX.XX....etc." so I went with it. I figured sewn in would be slower so needed to charge more than screen printing them. I'm also small potatoes and would say I'm 80/20 with retail and contract, so I understand a full contract or bigger company would likely be able to do them more efficiently.

As a side note my contract customer is asking if we can heat press the hoodies after we print them to "soften the hand" of them. This isn't because of any of our prints. The other place had to do that in order to get the hand my client was after. I've seen what the other shop did and looks like they were using 80 mesh screens for hoodies and just had a crapton of ink. With the proper mesh (thin thread" a roller, and right ink we've had excellent luck with getting a soft hand on most all hoodies like the Bella Sponge.