Wow, Screen Tape Costs!!!

[GraphicDisorder]

To be fair Inkman, Sam has the opposite problem as you lately it seems.  He seems to be having to work all weekend or a weekend day and such to put out orders.  In other words he has plenty of sales, and not enough time.  DTS in his situation buys him time he doesn't have.  DTS in your situation leaves you with more of what you already have too much of, extra time.

Not defending him as we know he's a ass but reality is he's not totally wrong in certain scenarios. 

Outside looking in your 2 shops are in different places it seems.  Of course that's true of most shops here as we all run our ship a bit differently. 

[Mr Tees!!]

IMO if everyone figured in the time savings not having to argue about DTS ROI they'd be able to afford the machine.  Just food for thought

...was going to post the same thing, B. Great minds, eh?

[inkman996]

To be fair Inkman, Sam has the opposite problem as you lately it seems.  He seems to be having to work all weekend or a weekend day and such to put out orders.  In other words he has plenty of sales, and not enough time.  DTS in his situation buys him time he doesn't have.  DTS in your situation leaves you with more of what you already have too much of, extra time.

Not defending him as we know he's a ass but reality is he's not totally wrong in certain scenarios. 

Outside looking in your 2 shops are in different places it seems.  Of course that's true of most shops here as we all run our ship a bit differently.

I agree with what you are saying and that is based on the Sam really being that busy. I don't know if it is true or not, we print more than him but we do not struggle to get jobs done on time. I judge this by the postings of his print figures on his DB. Going by them and the time he has owned his DB we print nearly double what he does. So how he is bursting at the seams and running weekends is beyond me. Our shop is definitely different than his, its our embroidery dept that really earns the revenue here. Occasionally we even have to run a second shift in that area to keep up. Sadly its not constant but for the most part it stays steady just not 100% full production 365 days a year.

[GraphicDisorder]

To be fair Inkman, Sam has the opposite problem as you lately it seems.  He seems to be having to work all weekend or a weekend day and such to put out orders.  In other words he has plenty of sales, and not enough time.  DTS in his situation buys him time he doesn't have.  DTS in your situation leaves you with more of what you already have too much of, extra time.

Not defending him as we know he's a ass but reality is he's not totally wrong in certain scenarios. 

Outside looking in your 2 shops are in different places it seems.  Of course that's true of most shops here as we all run our ship a bit differently.

I agree with what you are saying and that is based on the Sam really being that busy. I don't know if it is true or not, we print more than him but we do not struggle to get jobs done on time. I judge this by the postings of his print figures on his DB. Going by them and the time he has owned his DB we print nearly double what he does. So how he is bursting at the seams and running weekends is beyond me. Our shop is definitely different than his, its our embroidery dept that really earns the revenue here. Occasionally we even have to run a second shift in that area to keep up. Sadly its not constant but for the most part it stays steady just not 100% full production 365 days a year.

It seems to me either DTS has a smaller ROI than some of you think or Sam is busier than you think or it just wouldn't' work for his business.  Sam is a lot of things but I doubt he's the type to let a DTS run him out of business just to save face here on this site so if it wasn't working for his shop id be a betting man that he'd get rid of it. 

[Socalfmf]

Mike

this year we took on two huge contract customers.  one is doing about 10k shirts a week for a nationwide chain and just added another client that has 720 franchise stores.  we also just got a mail order catalog company that signed on and will do about 250k shirts a year based on the last 4 months of printing.  we are in the process of adding a new sprint dryer and another press. 

oh yeah we also added another 6 head emb machine, however even at 15 head Brandt still has 17...hahahahaha

so yes we are just that busy and we are doing between 8-10k shirts a weekend just so we do not hurt our regular client base. 

but then again who am I?   just a nobody!

[ebscreen]

Faster production on 10K piece order leans heavily towards multiple presses (or faster ones)
as opposed to faster setups. Sure, faster setup time will help but 10K of the same thing is gonna
get done a lot faster at 1500/hr as opposed to 500/hr.

[Socalfmf]

EB

these orders are between 500-2000 so set ups are really important.

sam

[Gilligan]

I know if is can save 50 bucks 100 times a year that is real money.

But the argument was saving $50 bucks ONCE a year.  Not 100 times a year.  That is the exact difference between the two discussions here.  One is about $50 bucks 100 times a year and the other is about $50 bucks ONCE a year.

10k pcs @ 500/hour = 20 hours
10k pcs @ 1000/hour = 10 hours

Are you suggesting that you are saving 10 hours a weekend (when you run those 10k pcs) because of your CTS?!

If so, me thinks that your systems before were severely flawed.

[alan802]

I think I've read a few comments here that might be confusing "can't afford a DTS because of ..." with "can't justify spending 50K on a supporting piece of equipment", we are the latter.  I think most everyone in this forum with at least one auto could find a way to put back $500 a month for a piece of equipment if it really did yield 11 months ROI.  My main questions were in regards to a smaller shop seeing a super fast ROI and it doesn't bother me that someone would get that kind of ROI, it bothers me that things are being left out of the discussion at this point out of spite, or pride, or whatever it may be.  I know Sam has taken on a bunch of new business but for the last 7 years he's been putting out about half of what we have done in these 7 years, and now he looks to be doing a similar volume with the numbers he just posted.  If I want to tell all you guys we did 2 million in screen printing sales with one auto but in reality we only do half of that, it doesn't really hurt anyone or anyone else's bottom line.  BUT, if you endorse a product or technology and others look at you for advice you better damn sure tell the entire story and back up your claims with facts.

We still tape up regi marks, but most of the time it's done at the taping table and not on press after test printing is done.  Taping regi marks here at our shop takes about 10 seconds per screen on the table and about 20 seconds per screen on press.  So if we waited to tape up regi marks on press for all of our screens every day we are spending under 7 minutes per day taping regi marks.  With DTS we would save that time and that is half an hour per week.  Not numbers to scoff at but bordering on being irrelevant in my opinion.  If you're comparing our shop to Sam's shop who is saving those 7 minutes, I'd argue that if we print for 4 hours out of the day at our usual 700-800 shirts per hour and Sam is maxed out at 550/hr then we make up those 7 minutes really quickly. 

DTS is going to be in the majority of shops with automatics one day, how soon depends on the manufacturers and if someone will build a unit that can do 20 screens an hour, trouble free/reliable, for $20K then holy cow where do I sign up.  Now if they remain at $50K and all but one of the supporting ROI info readily available says that the threshold for a shop to consider DTS is 40 screens per day then a shop that does under that isn't going to be making the best decision with their money.  If a shop our size can somehow show an 11 month ROI on $50K then I'd be asking questions like what were efficiency levels like pre-DTS?  If those questions have the wrong answers then I could start to see DTS having more of an impact on ROI.  The shop that can go from film to expo unit really quickly, doesn't have to wait long for vacuum drawdown, has a MH bulb and SBQ emulsion, a good regi system, etc. will have drastically different ROI with DTS. 

[alan802]

With Sam's new volume he needs a new auto, one that will do 1000/hr and then he'll see some super duper real ROI.  Printing 400-500 per hour versus 800-1000 per hour is some serious difference. 

[Mr Tees!!]

Seems to me that until we can define the difference between theoretical/ideal ROI, and real world ROI, then this conversation is a complete waste of time money 200-400 shirts an hour.

 

[JBLUE]

I know if is can save 50 bucks 100 times a year that is real money.

But the argument was saving $50 bucks ONCE a year.  Not 100 times a year.  That is the exact difference between the two discussions here.  One is about $50 bucks 100 times a year and the other is about $50 bucks ONCE a year.

10k pcs @ 500/hour = 20 hours
10k pcs @ 1000/hour = 10 hours

Are you suggesting that you are saving 10 hours a weekend (when you run those 10k pcs) because of your CTS?!

If so, me thinks that your systems before were severely flawed.

The average shop does not run at 1000 per hour. Hell the above average shop does not even do that for 8 hours on an auto most of the time. 5-600 pcs per hour are the realistic numbers.

 

[Gilligan]

I know if is can save 50 bucks 100 times a year that is real money.

But the argument was saving $50 bucks ONCE a year.  Not 100 times a year.  That is the exact difference between the two discussions here.  One is about $50 bucks 100 times a year and the other is about $50 bucks ONCE a year.

10k pcs @ 500/hour = 20 hours
10k pcs @ 1000/hour = 10 hours

Are you suggesting that you are saving 10 hours a weekend (when you run those 10k pcs) because of your CTS?!

If so, me thinks that your systems before were severely flawed.

The average shop does not run at 1000 per hour. Hell the above average shop does not even do that for 8 hours on an auto most of the time. 5-600 pcs per hour are the realistic numbers.

If thread has shown anything, it is that, sam's shop isn't an average shop.

[GraphicDisorder]

I have to question WHO'S sucking all of the profit out of your businesses.  Now multiple of you have gone as far as to say your shop is doing "double" or more than Sam.  When you say something like that it actually hurts your own argument when you make a statement like that.  How can DTS have such a poor ROI but Sam can easily afford it who apparently is "half" your shops size?

I'm wondering if some of you do a ROI on a shirt cart, or a table, or a freaking chair at this point that just improves quality of life in the shop.

[Socalfmf]

I invite any of you to come see my shop.  we are very systems oriented and we know where every penny is and how to maximize it. 

on the weekend work we are printing at 720/hr  that is the max our press can do.  also a lot of those jobs are 500-2000 pieces so set up is very important.  most are 2 color but there are a few that are three and when we can just set up and go with no micros it saves a lot of time. 

I would love to have 10k runs that just set up and go and a faster press would be great but we all know those jobs are not around anymore. 

so again anyone wants to swing by and see our systems come on by!