Small print jobs can create the most stress, here are some tips to make them go smoothly.
Small jobs are often printed on more expensive garments, making the profit margin quite thin. A mistake can cost you all of the profit, even more. For that reason, we have prepared some tips to live by when printing small jobs:
- Don’t underestimate small jobs. Not budgeting enough time to complete them will sometimes throw off your production schedule.
- Don’t stray too far from your usual process. Keep it official, even though the quantities are lower. If you stick to policies and procedures on every job, even smaller ones, you will have fewer mistakes. If you use a shop software, use it to track all of your jobs, even the small ones.
- Don’t wait until production day to open your box of shirts for the job and count them. If there is a discrepancy, you will most likely have re-order garments, wait a few more days and pay additional shipping costs.
- Don’t cut corners! The customer expectation is likely the same on every order, whether it is 12 or 1200. Cutting corners can backfire and have you re-printing and frustrated. Continue to manage customer expectations, in the same manner, you would with a huge job.
- Write a work order, and stick to it! This goes for every job and no less for small jobs. Your work order is your blueprint to execute on all of the work up to and including the production. Have everything documented so production is not held up by a trip to your computer to check imprint size, ink color, etc. That should all be on your work order!
