One question comes up more than any other from new sellers: what does print on demand actually cost, and can I really make money at it? After 20 years in this business, here is the honest breakdown.
The cost of a shirt. With Tshirtgang, a Gildan 5000 with your design printed runs $8, and a premium Comfort Colors 1717 is $13.50, print included. Shipping is flat rate: $5.95 for the first item and free for every additional item on the order. So a single tee lands under $14, and it drops fast on multi item orders.
What you sell it for. Basic tees move at $22 to $26 on most marketplaces. Comfort Colors sells at $28 to $32 because buyers can feel the difference. That puts $8 to $14 in your pocket per shirt with zero inventory risk.
Where the money actually goes for most sellers: ads. The sellers who keep their margins are the ones using marketplace search traffic instead of paid ads. This is why we built publishing to 19 marketplaces into the platform. One design pushed to Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Walmart, Shopify and more costs you nothing extra and multiplies your chances of free discovery.
The costs nobody mentions. Returns from bad sizing charts, redesigns because the art was built at low resolution, and slow production that tanks your marketplace seller rating. Production here runs in 1 business day, printed in North America, because seller ratings live and die on speed.
The bottom line. POD is profitable when you treat designs as inventory that costs nothing to hold. Publish steadily, price to your blank, let the marketplaces bring the traffic. No subscriptions, no minimums, no boxes in the garage.
Ready to run your numbers? Your first design takes about ten minutes to publish.
The cost of a shirt. With Tshirtgang, a Gildan 5000 with your design printed runs $8, and a premium Comfort Colors 1717 is $13.50, print included. Shipping is flat rate: $5.95 for the first item and free for every additional item on the order. So a single tee lands under $14, and it drops fast on multi item orders.
What you sell it for. Basic tees move at $22 to $26 on most marketplaces. Comfort Colors sells at $28 to $32 because buyers can feel the difference. That puts $8 to $14 in your pocket per shirt with zero inventory risk.
Where the money actually goes for most sellers: ads. The sellers who keep their margins are the ones using marketplace search traffic instead of paid ads. This is why we built publishing to 19 marketplaces into the platform. One design pushed to Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Walmart, Shopify and more costs you nothing extra and multiplies your chances of free discovery.
The costs nobody mentions. Returns from bad sizing charts, redesigns because the art was built at low resolution, and slow production that tanks your marketplace seller rating. Production here runs in 1 business day, printed in North America, because seller ratings live and die on speed.
The bottom line. POD is profitable when you treat designs as inventory that costs nothing to hold. Publish steadily, price to your blank, let the marketplaces bring the traffic. No subscriptions, no minimums, no boxes in the garage.
Ready to run your numbers? Your first design takes about ten minutes to publish.
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