I knew I should have walked away!!

[sweetts]

Ok new thread of jobs you knew you should have passed on but took anyway.
I ll start.
A guy would like twelve two color discharge jerzee tee shirts front abd back, friend of friend. I meet up with guy and it just feels like I should walk away. I don't and I end up popping a screen, reburning two screens, burn a shirt in the dryer and get discharge all over a new pair of shoes. The order was short one shirt so I refunded the cost threw in two extra shirts and the guy says his wife doesn't like the way they look and wants new shirts. Eerrrrrr


RT Screen Designs
www.rtscreendesigns.com

[mooseman]

I think his wife should get new shirts ..............from a new printer.
You didn't walk away the first time even though you gut said so
the discharge all over you new shoes was a omen, walk away............... what part of this don't you get.

mooseman

[blue moon]

I have a "should have known better" story. . .  it's in the same spirit, so hopefully not a faux pas.

We just started playing with the discharge and I was a little eager to take advantage of it. Along comes an order for 1200 pieces with a large red circle on the back. AHA! One swipe, plus a discharge fee, I was a happy camper, but something inside kept going, "It's 1200 pieces, maybe we should be selling our first DC job on something smaller. . .hmmm. And of course, I did not listen to my inside voice.). Then the first kink, "Oh, did I mention it has to be a PMS match?". nice . . . Ok, we are moving to DC ubase, it will still save us the headache of flashing. So we are using a DC base and shirts are rolling off the press like there is no tomorrow. 100,200,300,400 all is good! 500 or so the screen starts breaking down. We are getting thin lines where the squeegee rubs but are not catching them until the shirts are through the dryer. We tape one up and hope we are OK. 50 shirts later it's back up. OK tape this one and move along. We tape the piss out of the screen and think we'll be OK. 100 shirts later, it is back. We muscle through few more prints and finally replace the screen. Stack of bad shirts is getting pretty big by now and I am sweating it. The next screen breaks rgith before the end and there's 20-30 more. We still have the left chest to go! The front has to match the back so we ahve to use the DC and we have more problems. At the end of the run we had to order about 300 shirts to make up for the problems. I should have gone with  my instincts that kept ringing the bell, "NOT on such a big order, not on such a big order!!!"

'live and learn . . .

pierre

[ZooCity]

I think every below minimum order I've ever ran has been a"shoulda walked away".  I'm justifying them as loss leaders at this point.

[sweetts]

That's why I refunded him for the missing shirt I want nothing more to do with this order.


RT Screen Designs
www.rtscreendesigns.com

[Denis Kolar]

Pierre, I remember that job.
I walked in when you were running it.

RT, you have to know when to say NO.

I have the same problem

[jesterapparel]

I've learn if the first email they say "I have been burned in the past" then try and run away.  Far, far away

[mk162]

Kitson talks about this, and he's right.  For some reason it's so hard to say no.

I just quote folks like this really high, either it's more than worth it, or they leave.

[mk162]

I've learn if the first email they say "I have been burned in the past" then try and run away.  Far, far away

Most of the time yes, but sometimes the other shop couldn't deliver what was promised.  I also picked up a nice big account today because they "got burned."  I was curious how they did and they said on embroidery reorders the other company would bill them the same price for the shirt as before, but then they would add shipping.  So 2 shirts that cost $28 each before now cost $37 each.  The other folks don't embroider in house and have to pay to have it shipped over to them...2 shirts at a time.

[Inkworks]

We had a good customer bring in a whopping 18 cordura nylon folding cooler picnic basket/bags with vinyl liners. I was worried about the liners surviving the trip through the dryer, even at the lowered temps used for plastisol with nylon additive, so I put a blank bag through the dryer at regular temps at a pretty brisk pace, it came out looking okay, but inspection of the liner showed it had melted. It was the end of the day, so we just set up the screen and left it overnight. I have a wide range of inks to play with so I wasn't too worried, I have used vinyl ink and even 2-part pad printing ink on cordura before with decent success as air-dry prints. Of course the bags are lined so getting a secure hold-down on the platen is not an option, but it was black ink on light colored bags and a single hit should be just fine. Today came and we loaded up some vinyl ink and hit the bag with the melted liner as a test. It came out looking beautiful..... But as I watched the ink began to bleed into the rough weave of the cordura and within 60 seconds looked like crap, I mean it bled the line weights to be 300% of what the started out as. It wasn't thinned much at all, pretty much straight out of the can, so we pull the ink, wipe down the screen and mix up some 10:1 pad printing ink and load it up with a little retarder.

Pad printing ink dries at the speed of light, and shouldn't bleed like the vinyl ink did. A quick test print on the other side of the ruined bag looked like crap, the image has a ton of tiny detail and the pad printing ink just dries too fast for that, more retarder would likely mean the same bleeding problems as the vinyl, I mean it didn't even stay open for one print, so it was gonna need a lot more thinning/retarding and I didn't want to wreck any more bags trying to make it work, it's just different when it's the customers product.... So we pull that ink and wash the screen again. Screw it, I pull out some plastisol, add in nylon additive, dial down the oven as far as I dare, ~240F and speed up the belt beyond what I think is required for a cure, it's not like they'll be machine washing the bags anyway as the have a ridged basket handle. Hit one, looks beautiful! throw it through the dryer..... and it comes out the other end....... with a melted liner.....

Screw it, pull the job, call the customer and get on with life. Eat the set-up, eat the $10 worth of pad printing ink, eat the plastisol with the nylon additive, eat an hour or two of dicking around....Sometimes we'd be further ahead just giving the customer a $50 and telling them to go away before we even start....

[tonypep]

Pierre. At 1200 pcs were you using emulsion as a blockout, post exposing and hardening? Chasing a leak with tape almost never works with DC. Using this method we have successfuly printed up to 10K DC not a single prob

[GKitson]

Screen printers are genetically incapable of using the word NO at the proper time.

We are all basically greedy, independent, I can do anything, type A impaired invalids.

When you say yes at the wrong time here is what to do.

Learn from the experience, adjust pricing as needed to either make it Profitable or deter future repeats, and make sure your staff knows what happened.

I have been burned before by doing jobs that I should have said NO to, sworn I would never do it again, and then have my staff sell the same thing 2 weeks later because the boss did it! 

Communication folks!

~Kitson

[tonypep]

Agreed but sometimes communication is not always about when to say no but when to ask how

[balloonguy]

Many years ago we printed something like 3600 black mirror plaques. We had to use a 2 part ink with a catalyst to dry and a retarder to keep it from drying in the screen. The mirrors came from the client individually wrapped. Many were broken when they got here. Some were broken on the way out... They were $22.00 each for the blanks. I figured we could print in 3-4 normal working days. It ended up taking 10 days that were 12+ hours. The only good thing is that I did charge enough.

[Gilligan]

Never fails, those small orders beat you up for price and then are the biggest PITA and cry over every bit. Call you every step of the process and want it yesterday!

Or my buddy's Jeep club.  I give him price and tell him I will price him at 72 pcs but only make him print 12 at a time if  he keeps the art simple and in black because I can just use a crappy wood frame and catalog it.  He complains that he's only going to make $5 bucks a shirt that way.  Umm, and if I give it to you at the price you want I'm not even making half that?!  So he says what if I print 150 all at once.  Ok, that's a buck more but I'll hook you up (and I'm throwing in screen fees for free).  Then he starts talking about "can I get white ink?"  Yeah, but it won't be the same price... that doubles  my production time, I can't do that for the same price, this has been discussed!  "Well, that limits my colors of shirts."  Yep, a little bit, but here are some good options.  We move on.

Then there are 3 sponsors on the back.... can't get the art work... never get deposit (I specifically said BECAUSE he is a friend we should follow the rules so nothing goes wrong and messes up a friendship [club folding or something]).  They take FOREVER to get art and we already have shirts in hand waiting.  FINALLY get good art and then the phone calls start "when is my sh!t gonna be done?!"  Dude, you just got me the art work and I don't have a deposit!  I print anyway planning on surprising him with the shirts when he comes with deposit and just collecting it all.

In the end everything went well, and I finally had to tell them, shirts are ready come get them and send the check whenever.  They should up with check and picked up shirts.

Then the sponsor that paid for the majority of the shirts screwed the president's over on his jeep and they are pissed so the shirts are just sitting in a box at his house.

Not all that bad, but it's always friends that you hook up and then try to continue to beat you up on price and you have to hold their hand and then they want it yesterday!