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F.A.Q. |
| Below are some of the questions I have received on my YouTube Videos (www.youtubevideo.com/badalou )and questions asked through other sources. I will try to break them down into the group that most fits are area the question is aimed at. keeping it organized so you as the ready can find the question and hopefully the answer of a question you may have. that said please feel free to ask you own question if you do not find the answer here. I have attached a form to help you get the question answered. in the category that fits. |
| Q What is the best printer to buy for doing heat transfers? |
| A For quality printing using transfer designed for ink jet printing the it is recommended to use pigment inks. Pigment inks are available in most Epson printers and few HP printers. So for best of all printing an Epson printer. (See recommended printers here) |
| Q What equipment do I need to go into the tee shirt business? |
| A That is a broad question. It depends where you want to start, what budget you have and how much equipment you can use in the space you have to operate your business. You can start with a printer and a heat press and software to do your designs. The size of the press and the printer depends on your budget. You should add a cutter, plotter and one that does contour cutting. An example is a Roland GX24 (See recommended cutters here) |
| Q What is the best heat press to buy? |
| A This depends on your budget and what size you press you think you may need. Also what whistles and bells you want to have on it. (See recommended presses.) Common ground is a 15 x 15 size to start. Smaller press may hinder you ability to larger designs. |
| Q What is the best inks to use? |
| A In printers it is pigment inks. Look for Epson printers that say Durabrite. Pigment inks are also available in CIS system. (Continuous Ink Systems) HP also has Vivera inks. |
| Q What is Sublimation printing? |
| A This article will help you understand what Sublimation printing is. SUBLIMATION |
| Q What are plastisol transfers? |
| A In the world of screen printing one of the inks used is plastisol. Instead of a printer printing directly on a shirt they screen a release paper with your design. Then you simply press the paper on a shirt for screen printed quality. |
| Q Where can I buy apparel? |
| A There are numerous distributors available that will sell your apparel for your business. However before applying to them be sure you a have a resale certificate or sellers permit. I have used several companies. My recommendations are. www.sanmar.com www. bodekandrhodes.com |
| Q Do I need a license to run my business? |
| A Check with your local city and county offices. The simple answer is yes. If it is required and you don't have one and get caught then you could pay a fine. |
| Q Do I charge sales tax to my clients? |
| A Only if they are the end user of your sale. if you are offering sales to companies that will resell your product then they need a sellers permit and you need to have that number on file. Then you do not need to charge them sales tax. Also if you do business out of your state then you do not collect sales tax from that customer. You could be audited and if they find you did not collect sales tax and you did not have a record of the customers sellers permit you will be fined. You may also lose the ability to get a sellers permit. |
| Q Should I buy screen printing equipment? |
| A Do you want to do screen printing? The other avenue is plastisol transfers. |
| Q What is pigment ink? |
| A Most color pigments are made of chemically generated color plastic polymers that are ground to very fine particles then coated with a dispersant to help the particles develop a slight static charge. The static charge helps keep the particles suspended in low viscosity bases (a thin base such as water) suitable for inkjet printers. Unlike dye inks Pigment inks are harder to remove from fabric during washing cycles and are the recommended inks for heat transfers in ink jet printers. |
| Q I have a design idea and think it will sell. How can I get my designs into stores? |
| A We all fall in love with our own work. the problem is we don't buy our own work. You may get rave reviews from friends and family but that is not going to be the buyers of your product. What you should do is market test. make your design and then maybe have a few shirts done as you were making them for a customer. Show them to the places you are interested in selling them. marketing is first thing that should be done. selling in the retail trade is not easy. many companies produce product off shore (China) and show them at gift type trade shows. This is expensive side of the business and requires patience. If you can find a product rep that like your designs and they will show at trade shows for you as well as other product they represent then that is a plus. Be prepared to pay 15 to 20 % of the sale to them. |
| Q What size heat press should I buy? |
| A The minimum size I suggest is 15 x 15. next is the 16 x 20. if you are planning on doing large format printing then the 16 x 20 size is recommended. |
| Q I want to do vinyl apparel. What cutter should I get? |
| A That depends on a lot of variables. Just using vinyl for apparel you get a low cost cutter, say in the $600. range. However think bigger and you may want to do signs as well as contour cut heat transfers. Then I would get a cutter that does contour cutting like the Roland GX24. I recommend several other cutter here. (See recommended cutters here) |
| Q Where should I go to buy vinyl for tee shirts? |
| A many companies sell vinyl and offer great deals. I am one that likes 20 inch wide vinyl so I can gang my work and reduce the waste as apparel vinyl unlike sign vinyl is expensive. One company is www.heatpressvinyl.com also check www.jotopaper.com and www.wellintonhouse.com and www.imprintables.com and www.coastalbusiness.com |
| Q Who should I use to make my plastisol transfers? |
| A There are several great companies out there. I recommend 3. www.acetransco.com and www.first-edition.com and www.transferexpress.com |
| Q How much money does it take to set up a business? |
| A This depends on what type of equipment you need in doing your business. Meaning, do want to do screen printing? Do you want to do only heat applied graphics? Do you want to do vinyl? If you don't want to do direct screen printing then I would say you could get into the business with equipment and software for under $2500. |
| Q What kind of transfer paper should I get for doing white tee and dark tees. (This is the number one question asked us.) |
| A It seems like a simple answer but it is not. I get asked this all the time in emails and off my YouTube videos. The first thing I ask is what volume you are doing? How many colors are involved in the design? What equipment do you own? Who is your market. Why ask all these. Well there are so many options in choosing your direction. Now the answer becomes.. Hot peel inkjet for low volume multicolor. There are many papers out there for this and you may want to experiment with several. I use Jet Pro SofStretch ( www.heatpressessentials.com ) For darks it is the same answer only I use opaque transfer paper like Everlast For darks. ( www.heatpressessentials.com ) You could go with plastisol transfer for higher volume and the price for these is based on number required and number of colors involved. These are great for either light shirts or dark. Then there are vinyl transfers. For these you need a vinyl cutter. Then there is sublimation printing, laser printing. There are papers being invented all the time to make this easier for you so you need to ask your distributor for recommendations. |
| Q What heat press and size do you recommend for commercial heat transfer business? We are an established printing company and want to expand our services. |
| A. The minimum size should be 15 x 15. If you believe your going to do larger graphics and it fits your budget then the 16 x 20 is the most used. we do not recommend anything smaller. basically those are for the hobbyist. However most of those soon expand. |
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