Wanting to start printshop at home

[Guest]

In the next 6 months I am thinking about setting up a basic printshop in my garage. Starting out with envelopes, letterhead, and business card type work. I am wanting opinions. Is the day of the garage printshop over. The economy is terrible and the printing field is changing. Is it possible to succeed at this in this day an age?

I am thinking about starting out with the basics. A small CTP printer connected to my Mac, AB Dick 9810 or 9910 with T-head and envelope feeder, and a paper cutter.

What do you think? Go for it or forget about it?

 

[BigSi]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

I think your Mad. No seriousley it will be very tough. I think you will not survive unless you have some sort of
digital machine. If you are on a budget I recommend an old Xerox DC 1250. I have been there done that so I know what I'm talking about. You will also need some sort of marketing plan. Hope this helps Simon.

 

[Guest]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Thanks for the input, Simon.

So what you are saying is, you don't think there is enough work out there that an AB Dick 9910 can produce to keep a person busy?

You may be right. I just know the current shop I work for keeps its 9910 very busy. Sometimes it is the only press in the shop that is busy. It averages 3,000,000 impressions a year.

 

[BigSi]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Maybe if you target the envelope maket you will be ok. As you know envelopes are a problem for digital machines. I know that here in New Zealand it is very difficult for small offset to survive. Digital has taken
most of there work. My two heildelberg GTOs are very quite, 80% of my work go's onto my digital machine.

I know that here in Auckland what small offset work there is genraley gets put on bigger machine ( bigger
than AB dicks) just to give them something to do.

It is not uncommon to have a 4/5 colour Heidelberg GTO printing a one colour B/card just to give it something
to do, a $300.000 printing press doing a job that would just as good printed on a $ 3000.00 machine.

May be there is a market there for you, but remember when things are quite the bigger boys will give stuipid
prices just to give there machines something to do.

thanks Simon.

 

[Cory Smith]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

would think you might run into some zoning problems with a printshop in your garage.

 

[Guest]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Good point. I would check into that. I am out in a very rural area.

 

[oxburger]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Printshop, Garage, Rural.......

Only 2 words for you my friend:

Funny Money.

It would be profitable for sure. At least for a while until the Feds show up.

 

[BigSi]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Would the feds really show up? Here in New Zealand people ran print shops from there Garages all the time. There are zoneing laws in the citys, but most people ignore these. Its good to have a healthy disrepect for big brother. The only good
burecrate is a dead berecrate. Good to get that off my chest.

 

[oxburger]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

For a print shop, I'm not sure the Feds would show up. For a print shop printing counterfeit money, I'd bet they'd be there pretty quick. Though the government has bigger problems than counterfeiters, such as making sure we have plenty of bio-diesel instead of using the corn to actually feed the people who will now not be alive due to starvation and now not be able to actually use the bio-diesel fuel. Big Government.....gotta love em.

 

[Guest]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Not really where I was wanting this thread to go. No plans for printing funny money. Just wanting opinions on where the printing field is headed. Is the day of the old fashioned quick print shop gone?

I am assuming it depends on the area, correct? Competition and types of businesses needing printing. The internet has made it harder to compete since it is so easy now to place an order with a company in an entirely different state.

 

[oxburger]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

I think the only way to compete is to either specialize in something that's hard to come by, or by doing such a high volume that you can compete with the big boys. Unfortunately, they have the buying power when it comes to paper and ink as well as other supplies, so they're going to be able to undercut anyone when it comes to pricing a high volume job. In addition, I agree with your internet statement as well, they are the ones taking over the specialty printing segment. When a company decides to offer only brochures or business cards, they are simplifying their operation and by doing so, only buy a certain stock but do so in quantity and therefore get a lower price that they can pass on to the consumer. If I were to try to go into the printing business, I would try to find a niche that may not be available in your area and try to exploit it, whether it be vinyl banners, sports cards for the local sports leagues, bumper stickers, etc. As far as trying to do business cards, envelopes and the like, unless there is no other place in your area that offers it, I think you'd be hard pressed to be able to offer a lower price and still make a profit.

You said you were in a pretty rural area. Is there is alot of sportsman type activities where you are? Hunting? Fishing?

Maybe set yourself up with a large format inkjet printer and do custom enlargements of photos of hunters/fishermen with their trophies (something that would cost you 20 bucks in materials you could sell for 50 bucks).....

Just spitballing here....

 

[SlaveToTheMan]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

"Is the day of the old fashioned quick print shop gone?"

Interestingly enough, there's a HUGE resurgence in lettershops right now. Particularly small, independently run operations that do short-run custom work or boutique stuff. I keep coming across them on design blogs & places like Etsy.com too. Kind of cool to know there's still an appreciation for the old school printing alive & well!

 

[bphilippi]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

I would suggest making friends with the largest print company in your area you can find if you are going to be specializing. They have the buying power so rather than get shafted by the paper merchants, maybe try ordering some of your consumables through them. Apart from that, they may throw you some work every so often.

 

[ondemandbindery]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Been there, done that. It can work but there will be some obstacles. 1st will be to check with your local government and see if you can manufacture on yuor property. If not, get a P.O. box and state the business as a brokerage. This will work as long as you are not close to neighbors. People are nosy and you could get ratted outotherwise. Number 2 is the KISS theory to it (keep it simple stupid). Go for the down and dirty, simple stuff. We had a paperplate camera and it worked great. 2 presses, a small knife, tabletop folder, and some selling skills and you will find plenty of business cards, letterheads, and envelopes. And an excellent statement about getting in with a few big printers. One good shop and they will send you overflow because you will be small and your pricing should be right. But tread lightly if you begin to grow. The one thing to remember is if you are getting the work, someone else is not. And people are evil in that they will have you shut down if you do not cross your T's and dot your I's. That's what happened to me. Good luck and go for it.

 

[JonMartin]

Re: Wanting to start printshop at home

Depending where you are located, i think a decent digital machine might be a good idea - you can cut out your whole CTP system which will save you a bunch - maybe shoot for a niche in VPD, and other digital work. Just a thought - i our area there are a lot of small shops going under because they have not stayed up to date with technology. Like other PPL have said, it is really going to depend our your location and the amount of competition

 

[mauri]

In the next 6 months I am thinking about setting up a basic printshop in my garage. Starting out with envelopes, letterhead, and business card type work. I am wanting opinions. Is the day of the garage printshop over. The economy is terrible and the printing field is changing. Is it possible to succeed at this in this day an age?

I am thinking about starting out with the basics. A small CTP printer connected to my Mac, AB Dick 9810 or 9910 with T-head and envelope feeder, and a paper cutter.

What do you think? Go for it or forget about it?

I starting printshop over 30 years ago, and i have still printshop, but bot very big. Enought money, but not too much!

 

[mauri]

I starting printshop over 30 years ago, and i have still printshop, but not very big. Enought money, but not too much. I started it also garage only! I started step by step system, i buy always more new machine and more new machine, so today we have good machines and job enought! This is my advice you.

 

[ondemandbindery]

Forget about it. Atleast the way you are processing your thoughts. Amazingly enough a few Letterpress machines and I think you would have a better chance. But you may have the Entrepanuer Spirit.

If you want to run your own business go into the Service Industry. The USA society has gotten Obese and Lazy so why not do things that they don't want to do and make a business out of it?

Goodluck,
JW

 

[onwsk8r]

It sounds like a good idea for 1990. Any small shop will be competing against almost exclusively digital shops; while you are spending an hour doing a washup, they've already produced 500 business cards and are on to the next job. There's a reason small shops prefer digital. I've put in years at (small) hybrid shops, and it was quite a pain when we actually had to fire up the press.
In other words, I can produce 500 digitally printed business cards with less print costs than your first plate. I have customers that come in at 3:00 and expect the job to be done by 5:00. Can you do that with your offset press? Your competition can.

That being said, I've always thought a small, garage run /digital/ print shop could be a go. You wouldn't be able to do envelopes so much, but could be competitive on things like fliers, brochures, and potentially business cards. One digital machine, your Mac, a cutter, and a folder could churn out some work for local customers. Grow from there. Outsource as necessary.

While the equipment aspect is important, your marketing strategy is considerably more important. Would you be out selling? If so, who is running the equipment while you're out selling? If not, where is your business going to come from?

In my experience, quick print shops succeed more because of good salespeople than because of anything related to printing or print quality (although that's icing on the cake).

onwsk8r: Devil's Advocate Extraordinaire

nb: my dad started a quick print shop when I was 2 years old and I've worked at several over the years.