Anybody here a One Man Shop that went Auto?

[GraphicDisorder]

I wonder if the number of multi colour jobs that come in depends on the charges for the extra colours......I have seen some price grids where the extra colours were very cheap....Therefore, I am speculating that those folks get more multi colour jobs than folks who charge more for the extra colours.....So maybe the discrepancy is caused by a pricing problem....

Or another way to look at it is a pricing advantage... after all we are already handling the garment, the ordering, sorting, seps, screens, etc.  Whats another color.  Generally doesn't change many jobs time frame, and certainly ups the profit per. 

[Screened Gear]

One man shop here. As everyone said get as many heads as you can. Then set some time aside to learn the thing. It takes time to learn to print on an auto. You have to plan ahead on everything job you do, make sure you use the right mesh and have enough EOM. Another thing set aside some money for training, it will save you weeks of time, I wish I would have done that in the beginning. Also don't think your going to be printing 500 shirts an hour on every job with just you. Running an auto by yourself is not easy. You have to watch everything. I average 250 to 400 shirts an hour when everything is going good. Good luck

[Prosperi-Tees]

Printing on an auto with 1 person is kinda tough. You have to watch ink and lint. You can have a bunch of shirts screwed up before you even notice. The ideal way to run an auto is with 3 people. 1 loader, 1 unloader and a catcher/ ink guy looking over the shirts and keeping your screens inked. I just ran 100 shirts by myself and had 6 misprints that I did not catch until stacking the shirts. 6% misprint rate blows!

[royster13]

Or another way to look at it is a pricing advantage... after all we are already handling the garment, the ordering, sorting, seps, screens, etc.  Whats another color.  Generally doesn't change many jobs time frame, and certainly ups the profit per.

So long as it is an advantage to you....But if you are at least breaking even on the extra colours, maybe by just charging enough it makes your multi colour prices very competitive and that might lead to extra volume....I used to work at a steakhouse that wanted to make so many $$s per plate....So the higher end steaks were a great value and that created quite a volume of business....

[GraphicDisorder]

Or another way to look at it is a pricing advantage... after all we are already handling the garment, the ordering, sorting, seps, screens, etc.  Whats another color.  Generally doesn't change many jobs time frame, and certainly ups the profit per.

So long as it is an advantage to you....But if you are at least breaking even on the extra colours, maybe by just charging enough it makes your multi colour prices very competitive and that might lead to extra volume....I used to work at a steakhouse that wanted to make so many $$s per plate....So the higher end steaks were a great value and that created quite a volume of business....

I am up 53% this year, and keeping more money than ever.  Tripled in staff, more than 3x the embroidery heads, hey I don't pretend to have all the answers.  But something is working for us.

[Socalfmf]

Royster...and Et al.

this is business 101..know what it costs to run your machines, know what your overhead it, know what your tax liability is...then figure out how much you want to make and finally what your market can bear....

it really is that simple...but again I bet I can count on 1 hand how many people here have a real business plan...and the ones that do are the ones that are doing better and better every year....

sam

[sportsshoppe]

I say go with what your area needs, if it is multi color designs then go with the 8+ color, if you have a bunch of small color jobs go with 6 color. Just look at what you have been printing on the manual and go from there. If your wanting to get into some highend jobs ( other than process ) then spend the money. That brings up another point MONEY! Everyone cannot make that kind of investment. I say think it out do the research and Good Luck.

[inkstain]

Woah!  Cool guys!  Thanks to everyone for chiming in and giving me a good read for the day.  I should have mentioned what I ordered and will be getting in mid august:
Diamondback S 8/7 / Shuttle Flash the bigger size one / no shirt detector / the regular size pallets / youth pallets and sleeve pallets.
Also, bought a Sidewinder Solo for the random prints, just in case. 
Also got a 7.5 80 gal, ingersol compressor and chiller.  The compressor is a beast!
All New Equipment!  Christmas for days!!!

Gonna sell my 6/6 Manual press.

In the last 10 yrs or so I've only done two or three 6-color jobs.  I mostly do 1-3 color jobs.
Probably the next thing on my list will be a new dryer.  I know there will be some bottleneck there but just gonna have to deal with it for a time. 

Thanks again guys! 
Sam, I'll be calling you for sure at some time or another.  Thanks man!

[royster13]

Anyone who is not selling more colours often is probably not "selling" as much as they can....If you show your clients how much better a design will look with more colours and "nudge" them a bit, you will increase the value of your sales.....

[ebscreen]

Anyone who is not selling more colours often is probably not "selling" as much as they can....If you show your clients how much better a design will look with more colours and "nudge" them a bit, you will increase the value of your sales.....

While generally this would be true, in the retail world the game is typically "I have this design.." and then you figure
out how to print it. Ranges from one to way to many colors.

My spellcheck doesn't like the Canadian "colour" BTW.

[Inkworks]

Lot's of good replies so far.

24 months ago I was a 1 man show in 500 sq. ft. I was doing 80% pad printing along with parts and graphics screenprinting. Since I was already doing screens I bought a used 6/4 manual and that was the start of a crazy ride. It didn't take too many big multi-colour runs before I knew the next step was an auto. I took my time and shopped around for a good deal on a machine that would work for me and ended up with a 12/14 Falcon E with 2 big quartz flashes and a 20 x 28" print area. Most importantly I could run it without 3-phase, which the new 3000 sq/ft shop does not have. It was a huge leap of faith for me, but it's paid off. We now do garment printing to the tune of about 40% of our revenue and run 2-6 people in the shop. The 3000 sq/ft is full as we also added embroidery.

There is a definite learning curve of going from a manual to a auto, and much of that has to do with file preparation/traps/screen selection and pushing you comfort level with wet on wet printing. If you've already been doing that on the manual you'll be ahead of the game, but for many on a manual the flash becomes a crutch and I found that to be one of the biggest changes going to the auto. I had run autos at previous jobs, so I knew what to expect, but the $500 here and $2000 there to get all set up really got to be trying on cash flow. Some of the things that really added up was all the electrical, bigger exposure unit and light source, screens, compressed air dryer, screen racks, squeegee material, lighting, etc. etc. etc

My oven (24" belt 14' Hix with 9' of heat) is the bottleneck, but we can still push 40 dozen an hour without cure problems with plastisol. A small/medium gas is already on the wishlist for next year. As is a dip-tank and some bigger re-tens. we run 23 x 31s but they allow about an 18" tall print at the most due to squeegee/floodbar clearances.

Even with all the cost and challenges it was definitely the right choice. the first time you knock out 1000pcs. 5 colour shirts in an easy morning you'll wonder how you ever did it before on a manual. My 3000 sq/ft shop is packed with equipment now. I'm looking forward to settling in and rocking with the equipment we have, getting the new people trained up and smoothing out the workflow at the size we are, then hopefully I'll buy the building and add a 24' x 44' bay to get the signage shop out and free up some room!