Selling print on demand products online is a great way of making passive income in 2019.
The earlier you start, the better... because I firmly believe that the amount of money you make is correlated with how many products you have for sale, and how many places they're available for purchase.
Who do you think makes more sales, assuming both artists spend the same amount of time designing + uploading.
- Artist A) Spends ~3 hours designing and 1 hour uploading them it to a t-shirt on Amazon
- Artist B) Spends ~1 hour designing & 3 hours uploading it to t-shirts, hoodies, and coffee mugs on Amazon, Etsy, and eBay
Chances are artist A's design looks better and could even had broader appeal, but visibility isn't guaranteed, which is why I recommend uploading to multiple products & platforms (& re-uploading in scenarios where you aren't paying for listing fees).
Real estate is expensive in real life - but it's CHEAP online! So let your products occupy as much online real estate as possible :)
But back to the point - the answer to the question how much does it cost to start a POD business is $0!
Let me explain further.
Free Print on Demand Services
There are two POD services that I recommend using right away, because you make pure profit in selling products through them:
These aren't the only two platforms that function this way, but they're likely the two biggest ones that are most worthwhile.
Amazon Merch (or "Merch" for short) has an application process that used to take months, but in 2019 as long as you include a tax ID when you apply (use your SSN if you live in the US) you're likely to be accepted within 1-2 days.
Once you get an account, you can upload designs for sale on shirts, sweatshirts, hoodies, & popSockets at no cost to you, that appear for sale on Amazon.com. Oh yeah and the best part: they're all eligible for Amazon Prime!
In 2017, Forbes estimated that 64% of U.S. households have Amazon Prime & you can bet that the "Prime" checkbox next to your print on demand listings increases your odds of getting the sale.
Redbubble is similar to Merch, except it functions as its own marketplace (Redbubble.com) and thrives largely in part because Google sends them so much search & shopping traffic.
Redbubble is also good about running retargeting ads to help their artists get sales. Don't believe me? Visit their site, click around a bit, and see how long it takes before you start seeing Redbubble artwork in ads across other websites.
They also offer a wide variety of products that your artwork can be printed on. You can view the full list & base costs associated with each here.
Both of these platforms are great because of how easy it is to use them, combined with the fact that you don't even have a credit card on file, ever! It's pure profit!
POD Services w/ Credit Card
The next 3 print on demand services I'd like to recommend don't really function as their own marketplaces, rather they serve as production partners meaning after you get a sale on a large eCommerce platform like Amazon or Etsy, they download the sale, create the product, & ship it to your customer on your behalf.
You'll need to keep a credit card on file so that they can bill you for the materials & shipping costs before they send out your orders, but that also means you're only billed if you sold something - with the exception of Gearbubble, where there's a monthly fee associated with using them.
I didn't want to exclude Gearbubble though because I've been using them for close to 2 years to fulfill FBM Amazon orders for primarily coffee mugs & shot glasses, and I am grandfathered in where I don't have to pay monthly subscription fees.
My favorite service of the 3 is Printful, which I use to fulfill the vast majority of my newly created products in 2019.
If you're undecided about which PODs to use, you can always try both Printful & Printify (I'd recommend against using Gearbubble, because why pay a monthly fee?). I also wrote an article outlining the advantages of both Printful vs Printify.
I also wrote a previous article outlining different design software options that can be used to create beautiful designs for print on demand products - many of which are free!
The takeaway: It's absolutely possible start your print on demand business for FREE in 2019.
Print on Demand Fees Breakdown
Here's a quick peak at a typical breakdown of the fees structure associated with making a print on demand sale on a platform like Amazon, and fulfilling it with Printful:
I used Printful's embroidered hats as the product in this example, and the cost breakdown looks like this:
- Product Cost: 62%
- Shipping: 16%
- Fees: 22%
Product costs dominate the pie chart, and there's an obvious unaccounted for variable missing from the big picture: ad spend, which I intentionally omitted because the average POD seller (by my estimations) doesn't advertise their listings.
p.s. Fetcher is my favorite profit analytics tool for staying on top of my Amazon margins. Try it out! there's a free 1 month trial (no cc required).
I should also point out that shipping costs only accounted for 22% of the pie in this case, because Printful's dynamic shipping prices are so low & present a massive edge over other most POD platforms.
Both Gearbubble & Printify charge sellers a flat rate for shipping & the costs are usually pretty high in my opinion. I suspect they're making money off us sellers on both product & shipping costs.
Print on Demand Profit Breakdown
Enough talk about fees! Lets dive into the reason we do print on demand: the profits!
When we introduce profit into the equation, the full breakdown of a typical print on demand sale takes form:
- Product Cost: 47%
- Shipping: 12%
- Fees: 17%
- Profit: 24%
Remember that each eCommerce site charges their own "referral fee" for allowing you to sell on their platform.
In my experience, it works out to somewhere around:
- Amazon: 17%
- Etsy: 12%
(they advertise a 5% fee but there's plenty of hidden fees that bring it up above 10%) - eBay: 10%
Here's the actual cost breakdown for a real order that came through from Amazon.com on 4/3/2019. I sold a Yupoong 6007 Five-Panel Flat Bill Cap with flat embroidery, that has a base cost of $13.75.
- Order date: 04/03/2019
- Price: $24.99
- Shipping: $4.60
- Amazon fees: -$5.03
- Your earnings: $24.56
- Product Cost: -$13.95
- Actual Shipping: -$3.28 (+$1.32)
- Profit: $7.33 (24.7%)
When all was said & done, we took home $7.33 of profit, & the best part is that we didn't have to do ANYTHING at all after creating the initial product listing!
Following the order Amazon emails you to let you know you sold an FBM product, but Printful will automatically download the order (it syncs about 3 or 4 times per hour), and typically within a few days the product will be printed (or embroidered in this case) & shipped out to your customer.
They also upload the tracking information for you, and mark the order as shipped! (this also worked on other marketplaces like Etsy).
Starting a print on demand business in 2019 as an extra source of passive income is a no-brainer, so get to it! :)
I also recommend using your POD profits to bankroll your Amazon FBA business, because the more passive income streams you have, the better!
