Charging Strategy for Stitches/Colours

[Stitch Up]

We always have a problem working out what we should charge for an embroidery job!

1. Creating the pattern.
2. Number of colours and/or stitches.

We're just embroidering a one colour design of 47,024 stitches on a fleece in one colour. The design measures 25cms wide by 18.5cms high. We have no idea what we should charge for this!

We obviously need to have some consistent way of calculating the price to charge.

Anyone have a calculator for this?

Thanks

John

[ArferMo]

That's a very time consuming job that one and the noise

[Stitch Up]

That's a very time consuming job that one and the noise

Very noisy although out Tajima is relatively quite!!

The noise doesn't bother me so much as I set it going and hide somewhere else. I put a webcam on it so I can see if there's been a break or whatever.

[Earl Smith]

Hi John, another embroidery thread...
I charge nothing for digitising if the job is just text. That I can do easily in the Wilcom program which, I believe, you have as well. However, if the deisign needs some graphics doing I will charge between 10€ and 20€ depending on how long it takes to do. If I send the work away to be done I make a standard charge of 30€. If the digitising costs more then the customer pays for it. I explain all that when we are doing the consulting.
AS for the actual embroidery. I worked out my machine cost at 30€ an hour. So your design with 47,000 stitches should take around an hour to do so I would charge 30€ . If there is more than 4 or 5 garments to do then I would drop the price down to 25€ each.
Thats my calculations at my costs. Yours might be different if your costs are more. Remember, my costs are in Euros.

[socialgiraffe]

When I did embroidery I followed the large embroidery houses who charged per 1000 stitches (or part there of). So for example, if you charge 60p per 1000 stitches and the job is 47,000 stitches it would be costed as follows:

50 (47k is rounded up to 50k) x 60p = £30.00
Some also added an additional 20p per colour change

With regards to digitising, I think Earl has the best solution although there are some companies who charge a flat fee regardless. If you simply send it to them and put a mark up you know exactly what you are going to make each time.

[logobear]

we do flat rate digitizing of £25
47k stitches would take about an hour, so about £30 for the first one.
But how many do they want, and how many heads have you got?
The material cost is virtually zero, but it is a lot of time & noise!

[jennywren]

When I did embroidery I followed the large embroidery houses who charged per 1000 stitches (or part there of). So for example, if you charge 60p per 1000 stitches and the job is 47,000 stitches it would be costed as follows:

50 (47k is rounded up to 50k) x 60p = £30.00
Some also added an additional 20p per colour change

With regards to digitising, I think Earl has the best solution although there are some companies who charge a flat fee regardless. If you simply send it to them and put a mark up you know exactly what you are going to make each time.[/QUOTE

we send our away to be digitised and then put our mark up and for us that is so much simpler

[Stitch Up]

Thanks all for the replies.

We didn't charge nearly enough for that job and it took an age! Fortunately we just started the stitching and left it.

We need to be competitive but not excessively so

What would be a reasonable charge for a left breast logo of say 5cms x 10cms or maybe 6000 stitches - is there an average stitch count?

a. One colour
b. Two colour
c. Three colour
Etc etc

What I need to be able to do is print up a flyer showing prices and be able to quote when a customer phones or pops in the shop.

Cheers

John

[Stitch Up]

Not cast in stone and for upto 5 items.

Embroidery Pattern Pricing
Minimum charge per left breast logo £4.50 up to 4,500 stitches single colour.
Plus:
20p for each additional colour.
60p for each additional 1000 stitches or part thereof.

e.g
6.500 stitches with 3 colours
Minimum charge £4.50
3 x 20p (3 colours) £0.60
2 x 60p (2000 add stitches) £1.20

Total £6.30

About right?

[Paul]

Out of interest, what quality 4.500 stitches will provide?