0:03

Welcome back to the Print On Demand . Cast

0:06

this episode . We're going to talk about the downside

0:08

of POD . Let's

0:10

get into it

0:20

.

0:20

Welcome to this week's episode of the Print

0:22

on Demand cast . Each

0:29

week , join the gnarly , travis and Josiah as they provide insight into the print-on-demand

0:31

industry and equip you with the totally tubular tools , advice and strategies

0:33

you need to achieve success and , hopefully

0:36

, have a few laughs along the way . Now

0:38

on to this week's totally tubular show

0:40

.

0:43

Welcome back to the Print on Demand cast

0:46

episode 218 . It

0:48

is great to be back with you all . I'm

0:50

Josiah and , as always , joining

0:52

me for this podcast , the

0:54

co host , travis Ross from

0:56

make your mark design . Travis

0:58

, top of the evening to you

1:00

. Top of the evening to

1:02

you as well . Top , top of the evening . Uh

1:05

yeah , how's things going there at old

1:07

old make your mark design oh

1:10

yeah , we're , you know , still

1:12

getting orders and trying

1:14

to get a mark

1:15

making our mark . That's right . Yeah

1:18

, uh , finished up a big order

1:20

this um this weekend

1:22

and and then he , as soon as he came

1:24

and got it , he he like called me back and said

1:27

, hey , can I do some more ? And so

1:30

doing , uh , just send him another

1:32

order thing and or , you know

1:34

, an order form , um yeah

1:36

. Yeah , and then I

1:38

don't know if anybody ever goes to uh , make

1:40

your mark design the website

1:42

, make your mark dot design . But uh , uh , make

1:45

your mark design the website , make your

1:47

markdesign . But uh , kind of redid that

1:49

whole deal on

1:54

the front end and connected with a company

1:57

that allows me to kind of sell

2:02

in bulk and really not touch any of it . So it's pretty cool . If you want to check that out

2:04

, you , you can ask me about that , you can ask me about that later . Probably should have saved

2:06

that for a point of interest sometime

2:08

. But it's a

2:10

cool little cool

2:12

company that allows , is

2:16

allowing me to do that . It is , it is an invite only , and I knew a guy and so the guy

2:18

introduced me to the other guy and then that

2:21

guy said here you go , but

2:24

it it allows you to yeah

2:27

, you go , but it allows me to sell stuff

2:29

without touching it , but then also

2:31

they can still reach out and I

2:34

can still obviously take on doing

2:37

a lot of laser patch hats lately

2:39

. So that's kind of cool . Yeah

2:42

one of our former Marla , actually

2:44

reached out to me and said hey , I'm from

2:46

Joyhouse Open Estes . She wanted me to

2:48

do some more hats , so

2:51

doing some for her got those on the way

2:53

and then a couple other

2:55

people you know have been reaching

2:57

out to me for those patch hats , which is really

2:59

cool . Hope Long

3:01

may it last . Yes

3:04

.

3:05

Hopefully longevity and all of all

3:08

of the great success in the future

3:10

. And , of course , another thing people should

3:12

know that happened over

3:14

the weekend . I mean , you and I have seen each other

3:16

already this weekend , but

3:18

you won

3:20

. You won the poker night and that is Travis's

3:23

victory photo . There was nine of us and

3:25

lots of new faces around the table

3:28

, but it came down to the

3:30

four usual suspects

3:32

that typically comes down to , myself

3:36

included , but yeah , it was a great night . It

3:38

was one of the longer games we've had in a while

3:40

, actually , just because of the number

3:42

of people . Usually we're out of there by like 10 , 30 or 11

3:45

now now , but there was just so many

3:47

people which is always a good thing .

3:49

Yeah , I think this photo was actually taken like right

3:51

about midnight , so um yeah

3:53

, get home till probably 12 , 20

3:56

, 12 , 30 yeah

3:58

, yeah , it was .

3:59

Uh , it was a good time .

4:00

Fun , fun , fun was had thanks for

4:02

bringing that up , man . I appreciate that . Well

4:04

, while you've been gone the last couple weeks

4:06

um , you know , I've been holding down the fort

4:09

I had . I did one uh , episode

4:11

, what was it ? Episode 2

4:13

216

4:15

. It was a interview that I did at

4:18

printing united with cole lundstrom

4:20

, which is really cool , a lot , of , a

4:22

lot of cool insights in that one , and then last

4:24

week I talked about the power of consistency , but

4:26

both weeks I've talked about the fact that you

4:29

weren't here , and it's because of some changes

4:31

that are going on in your life and , um

4:33

, some pretty cool things have happened in

4:36

your life lately and I would love for

4:38

you to share that

4:40

with the audience .

4:42

Yeah for sure . So for those

4:44

of you that have been following

4:46

the show for a while , you know that Print

4:50

On Demand Cast hasn't been really or not Print On Demand Cast

4:52

, but Print On Demand . I haven't been in the industry

4:54

and the day-to-day of it for almost

4:57

three years now , and

4:59

so you know , beginning of this year

5:01

I stepped into a

5:04

job with a placement company

5:06

where we help families who

5:09

are looking for senior living for their loved ones

5:11

, whether that's assisted living , memory care . So I was doing

5:13

that for a handful of months and

5:16

really enjoying it , and

5:18

it's an independent contract position , which is

5:20

nice . It provides a lot of flexibility

5:23

. That is fantastic

5:25

. And then , really

5:28

out of nowhere , the

5:31

opportunity came to

5:33

me in August to

5:36

step into the creative director

5:38

slash creative pastor position

5:41

at the church I've been attending and a part of the creative

5:43

team there for the last three

5:46

years . And when I say it was out of nowhere

5:48

, it was actually very , very

5:50

shocking that this was happening

5:52

. And so , through

5:55

obviously a lot of conversation with my

5:57

wife and with

5:59

the lead pastors there

6:01

and even Madeline's parents

6:03

and my family , and just praying

6:06

and seeing if this was the right timing

6:08

, cause often , even though an opportunity

6:11

comes along , it doesn't necessarily mean it's the right

6:13

timing for the opportunity . So

6:15

, really trying to make sure that

6:17

that's what was best

6:20

for the season and all of us , kind of unanimously

6:23

, were on the same page , which

6:25

is super exciting . So I accepted that position and

6:28

still placing clients

6:30

you know , one or two clients a month with my other job , um

6:33

, because I have flexibility with my , the church

6:35

as well . So all

6:37

that to say , um , since sometimes since

6:40

september 17th , uh , officially

6:42

stepped into that capacity here

6:44

, um , at the church

6:46

, here in loveland . So a lot

6:48

of wild , rapid

6:50

transitions happening in

6:52

the last month , I mean coupled

6:54

, you know my , you know my childhood

6:57

home being sold and my mom moving

6:59

and and dealing with the emotions of that

7:01

and then going to visit her and then in the

7:03

, the midst , literally all of this is happening at the same

7:05

, at the same time . So it's

7:08

just been , it's been wild to

7:10

to do that and as , as a result

7:13

of that , at

7:15

the outset of my accepting

7:18

the position , I was like well , no

7:20

, I , you know , had a conversation with Travis

7:22

. He's like what

7:28

, you know , I had a conversation with Travis . He's like what's that look like for the show ? And I was

7:30

like I think it should be okay because I have flexibility in both . And then I realized after two

7:32

weeks like , wow , I like it , I'm busy Monday and Tuesday evenings all the time , but

7:34

it's that like the space that I

7:36

have is like I'm

7:39

trying to safeguard that space and just

7:41

the rhythm of trying to , you know , basically

7:44

shift a culture

7:46

of a department that's been running and doing

7:48

great but trying to make changes and just hitting

7:50

the ground running , and then the placement stuff . I was like

7:53

I don't genuinely think

7:55

that I can really give

7:58

my full attention , not even my full

8:00

attention , I can't . My bandwidth is

8:02

being eaten up very , very quickly . Um

8:05

, so , as a result of that

8:07

, over the last two weeks that kind of told travis

8:10

I had another conversation of like I think it's

8:12

time to chat about what it looks like

8:14

for me to exit out

8:16

of the print , of print on demand cast

8:19

, which is something I put off as long as I

8:21

possibly could because it's something that I genuinely

8:23

have enjoyed doing , even

8:30

though I haven't been in the day-to-day for the last three years of print-on-demand . I'm really

8:32

facilitating as a host to the permanent guest which is Travis , and

8:34

that's basically been my role . I've

8:36

not been

8:38

inundated or digging into what's new

8:41

or getting the lowdown on all the

8:43

new technology and stuff like that , because it just hasn't

8:45

been my world for such a long time . And

8:48

you , to peel the curtain even further back

8:50

with the placement job that I

8:52

was having , I was getting busy to the point where I

8:54

wasn't even really able to help with the editing

8:56

side of things anymore , and so it

8:59

kind of was just like this natural progression of like . Okay

9:01

, I think it this makes

9:03

sense . So , again , progression of like . Okay , I think it this makes sense

9:05

. So , um , again , avoided it as long as I could

9:07

. But , uh , all that to say

9:10

that after , well , what

9:12

would now be 218 episodes , um

9:14

, this will be my final

9:16

episode with you guys here on the front of the man

9:18

cast . Um , I'm still in the groups . Obviously it

9:21

might catch me here and there . If you

9:23

know we get travis gets to show 300

9:25

. Maybe I'll pop in just to be a

9:27

host or a fun

9:30

side guest . I don't know all that to say . It

9:32

probably isn't the last time you're gonna see me , but it's

9:34

gonna be um , a lot

9:37

, a lot longer in between times

9:39

. Yeah , because of where I'm at now

9:41

in terms of life

9:43

and bandwidth and and wanting

9:45

, you know , start a family in the next year . So who knows

9:48

what , what the future holds

9:50

. But , um , but yeah , it's been . Obviously

9:53

I mean Travis and I've talked about this if you've

9:55

listened to the show for a long time this was a kind

9:58

of a passion project that we started when we were both

10:00

in the industry , kind of like man

10:02

. Wouldn't it be nice if there was a show

10:04

that actually gave quality insight

10:06

to this industry , instead of drinking

10:08

from a fire hose at a table in portland

10:10

oregon trying to figure out the hell we're supposed to do

10:12

with our lives ?

10:13

you know what ?

10:13

I mean like , so we

10:15

know there was an obviously a hole in the market

10:17

and so to be able to step in

10:20

and um and provide

10:22

or attempt to provide that and

10:24

the way that we felt was the

10:26

best that we could , and then to hear the feedback

10:29

from people and really I've

10:31

said this a lot on the show and it

10:33

bears repeating and it's genuine that

10:36

it's always humbling and surprising

10:38

when someone

10:40

in the Facebook group reaches out or you

10:42

get a text or a message from somebody on Facebook

10:44

like , hey , you guys have really helped me . Thank you

10:46

so much for the show . Like it's

10:48

. It's awesome to know that this has

10:51

found a place in the kind

10:53

of sphere of

10:55

of the print on demand world

10:57

and I'm super

10:59

excited to see where it continues to go , where

11:02

Travis takes it , you

11:04

know , doing a lot of the courses and stuff and stuff that we've

11:06

talked about behind the scenes for a very long time . So

11:09

to see that kind of you know have legs

11:11

and start to happen is is

11:13

awesome . So , um , I want to

11:15

thank everyone that is listening

11:17

um , for your support

11:20

and your love and your fandom

11:22

which is weird to say , weird word

11:24

for me to use um , but

11:26

your continuous support and also just thank travis

11:28

for for inviting me into this in

11:30

the beginning and having it be kind of like a

11:32

let's see what we can do with this thing

11:34

. Um and uh

11:36

, you know lots of good times , memories

11:38

and obviously , honestly too , um

11:41

, the reason I love the show is because it was a

11:43

weekly touch point for you and I to just shoot the

11:45

, shoot the breeze and tell dad jokes . You

11:47

know what I mean is right as life gets busier

11:49

, um , they have , like at least I'll have

11:51

an hour and a half to just , you know , talk

11:53

printing and tell dumb dad

11:55

jokes and have that

11:58

point of connection as well . But , uh , but

12:00

yeah , so that that's the news . Um , going

12:02

here from here on out , um

12:04

, it'll be Travis , or if Travis gets another

12:06

host or whatever , it'll be that

12:08

duo .

12:10

Oh , he's already waiting in the wings . He's been waiting

12:12

for weeks . I was going to say he's been two

12:14

weeks ago he put out the ad .

12:18

But can you click buttons efficiently ? You're hired

12:20

.

12:20

That's basically what .

12:21

I do Just click a lot

12:23

of buttons . So

12:27

yeah , all that to say , um , but super grateful , super thankful

12:29

for the 218

12:31

episodes . Again , it's probably 216

12:34

more than we both thought we would ever make

12:37

in this , in this , in this rss

12:39

feed , um , but yeah

12:41

, like I said , I'll be a silent

12:43

supporter and you know , like I said , there's

12:45

milestone episodes where it's

12:48

fitting or I'm available to come in and

12:50

just say , hey , how's things going ? You

12:52

know that kind of thing open that , but uh , but

12:54

yeah , that's news , that's big changes . Um

12:57

, so there , there you have it . Now

12:59

we'll just continue on with the episode

13:01

, like I didn't say that , and then you guys just

13:03

wonder where I am next week . So

13:06

if you fast-forwarded through the waffle this time again , you

13:08

might want to rewind , because this waffle was actually

13:10

informative . You might have been

13:12

like oh God news , josiah got another dog

13:15

or something . But no , that's not what

13:17

the news is . So , yeah

13:20

, but yeah there it is .

13:22

So , yeah , I mean , guys , if

13:24

you want to reach

13:26

out to Josiah , sell him . Thank you , that would be

13:28

super cool . You can do that in our Facebook group because

13:31

you

13:34

know it is . It

13:37

is a sad day at the print on demand cast but

13:39

, like Josiah said , it's also

13:41

you know it's cool that he's getting this new opportunity

13:43

at his church and , like Josiah said , it's also you

13:45

know it's cool that he's getting this new opportunity

13:47

at his church and you know it's it's kind of been a long time coming

13:50

and it , but I'm definitely going

13:52

to miss . You know you do you do more

13:54

than just push buttons . You're a great host

13:56

and

13:58

it's always been fun to have somebody . Like you said , it's been fun to have that connection

14:00

point every week and I'm going

14:03

to miss that for sure . I'll

14:05

just have to , you know , like settle

14:08

for beating you in poker every once

14:10

in a while .

14:13

I was just . I was just going to say we'll just have to , you know , up the frequency

14:15

that you beat me in poker .

14:17

I hope we can .

14:18

Yeah , if you survive the other nine

14:21

.

14:21

well , basically , zach , cause he's a wild card , but

14:23

no one knows who that is , so anyway , but

14:26

yeah man , thanks so much and uh , yeah , looking

14:28

forward to seeing where the pod

14:30

cast continues to go and

14:32

uh , yeah , well in

14:35

light of this being your last show , um

14:37

, I would like to

14:40

give you the opportunity to

14:43

do everybody's , to deliver

14:45

everybody's favorite part of the

14:47

show the weekly dad joke . Time

14:52

for the weekly dad joke .

14:53

All right . So any

14:56

of you that know my wife or have you

14:58

know I don't know who knows my wife and listening

15:00

but one thing you should know about

15:03

my wife is that she loves line

15:05

dancing . Like the amount of time

15:08

she's wanted to just go to Grizzly Rose , which

15:10

is a place here in Denver . She

15:12

wants to line dance all the time . In fact , I'm

15:15

like I got worried for

15:17

a second because of how like obsessed

15:19

she was with the idea and we discovered that she actually

15:21

has an addiction to

15:24

country dancing . So so she's fighting

15:26

that addiction and to fight that addiction

15:28

she's actually now in a good

15:30

two-step program and

15:37

that's this week's weekly dad joke uh

15:40

, yeah use that one in your

15:42

, in your water cooler talk . That was pretty funny

15:44

, uh . There's another one that

15:46

was even funnier from an old show , but

15:48

that's uh , maybe

15:51

not the most appropriate

15:54

you devil .

15:55

That was , that was . That was pretty good , but

15:57

yeah , I , I definitely like that .

15:59

Uh , two-step , two-step yeah , that's

16:01

good , awesome

16:03

, all right . Well , going forward

16:06

along again in another segment

16:08

. And , by the way , dear listener , we thought we would

16:10

just inundate you with all the bumpers we've ever had for

16:12

every one of these segments , just as a like a

16:14

hey , remember when we had this bumper , but

16:16

we actually decided to spare you , um

16:18

, all of that , so you're

16:20

welcome for that . So , but with that said , we're going

16:23

to go into the point of

16:25

interest . Point

16:45

of interest

16:48

that

16:53

, coincidentally , is my favorite

16:55

bumper that we've used for that segment

16:57

. Um , so , yes , the

16:59

point of interest , travis . Let us hit

17:01

me in all the you're hitting me in all the .

17:03

That , coincidentally , is my favorite bumper that we've

17:05

used for that segment . So , yes , the point of interest , travis

17:07

, let us know . You're hitting me in all the feels . Man

17:09

, I just as things . It's really so . We have episode notes that

17:11

we have every week and we , you know , have

17:14

episode 218 , and then we have a title , you know , or something that we keep in our

17:16

episode folders and , as that

17:18

thing is playing and it's like emotional and

17:20

josiah just shared all this stuff , and I look up

17:22

and it says episode 218 , the

17:24

one where josiah dies which

17:28

, fyi , did

17:30

not .

17:31

Uh , did not name it that

17:33

, so I

17:36

did not . Guilty , yeah

17:38

, anyway . So no , that's funny , okay . So yeah

17:41

, part of interest , you've got something

17:43

that is actually

17:45

really cool . And for Etsy sellers

17:47

, there's the buzzword Everyone loves Etsy . This

17:51

is actually a really dope integration . So Travis is going to share his screen

17:53

and show us all about Hello

17:56

Custom .

17:58

Yeah , and show us all about Hello Custom . Yeah . So

18:00

Hello Custom is a lot of you probably

18:02

have heard about it because it came

18:05

on the scene , I don't know , maybe a year ago and

18:07

it was pretty popular . A lot of people were like

18:09

, oh my gosh , you can customize

18:11

really easy . It's kind of

18:13

an automated customization plugin

18:15

or program

18:18

for your Etsy store . It

18:20

uses AI to identify what

18:22

the person types into that custom field and

18:26

then it uses your

18:28

settings in Hello Custom

18:30

to then say , okay , well , this is where the name

18:32

goes . And the AI

18:34

says , well , this is the name , so it puts it there and then it

18:36

uses okay , this is where the date goes , and

18:38

et cetera , et cetera . So it's

18:40

been going for about a year and

18:43

recently they announced

18:45

a lifetime subscription

18:48

to this software and

18:50

I for for $69

18:52

. And I was like , holy

18:54

crap , I got to get this , you know , and

18:56

I couldn't necessarily justify

18:58

the , the monthly expense because I wasn't really

19:00

using it that much , but I thought , man

19:03

, this is for $69

19:05

. I can jump in here and surely

19:07

make my money back , you

19:09

know . Plus , they were talking about an Amazon integration

19:12

that was coming in the next few

19:14

weeks , which they have since released

19:18

. Um

19:20

in the next few weeks , which they have since um released . It's still in beta , they're

19:22

still having some issues , we're having some issues , other people are having issues with it

19:24

, but for Etsy it's really working really

19:27

, really well and so I just wanted to share . This

19:29

is so you basically

19:31

have this uh approval queue and

19:33

I don't have anything in it because I actually

19:36

got an order yesterday

19:38

for 10 Christmas

19:41

ornaments and I'll

19:43

show you . So I have these

19:45

different , you know ornaments

19:48

here , so this one has one , two , three , four

19:50

, five , six , seven , eight , nine . This

19:53

one , ok , this is the one that sold right

19:55

here . So the

19:57

the person wanted us

20:00

to add the

20:03

name of a company and then I think they had

20:05

like eight people inside

20:08

of you know the company , so the

20:10

company's name would be up here and then each one of

20:12

these would be the name , and they ordered 10 of them so

20:15

they could give them out , as you know , christmas

20:17

gifts to their staff or whatever Um

20:20

. So , like , each one of these is

20:22

actually editable and

20:24

so that , technically , the AI will

20:26

come in here and they've just redone

20:29

some of this . They just had an update to where

20:31

um this could be name

20:33

one , this can be named two and

20:36

you see the tags up here . Uh , for

20:38

name . They previously only

20:40

had um . You could only add

20:43

customize one name , but

20:45

now they've added to where you can do custom

20:47

tags so you can do name

20:49

one , name two , name three , and the ai

20:52

will then recognize which

20:54

one and then put it in in the same font

20:56

and you can obviously change the font . You can

20:58

change the font size as you set all this up . So

21:01

basically what the process is is that

21:03

you create this ornament in printify

21:05

, um with generic

21:08

text in it and then

21:10

you push that uh

21:12

, generic um ornament

21:14

you know , to etsy

21:16

and then you change all of your you

21:19

know , you change all of your mock-ups

21:21

and all of that stuff to show that it's

21:23

customizable . You make it customizable

21:26

, you explain , you know , you put instructions

21:28

for the customization and

21:31

then you know it's listed and when that

21:33

product sells it'll

21:36

send it to Printify with the generic

21:38

data on it and

21:41

Hello , custom , since it's kind of in the

21:43

middle at that point it sees that

21:45

and it sees that SKU , that

21:47

you've named it , and it immediately cancels that order

21:49

and then brings you back to

21:52

this approval queue , which again it's empty

21:54

right now because I've already approved

21:56

the order . Actually

21:59

it's in my archives , it's this

22:01

one right here , and so it

22:03

brings that in there . And then I

22:05

go in and I make sure that it said you

22:07

know , rusk , bail Bonds , larry Kim

22:09

, dana , landon , tom , et cetera , et cetera

22:11

. And then I click approve

22:14

and then it pushes it back

22:16

to Printify . It

22:19

duplicates the order but sends the correct print

22:21

file with it , and so then Printify fulfills

22:23

it , et cetera , et cetera . So it's a really

22:25

cool , you know it

22:27

is . It does take some time to set it up , but

22:31

I have one of my VAs doing it and you can see

22:33

she's doing all these different ornaments

22:35

and things and she's just creating

22:37

them in Canva and then we're pushing

22:40

them , or she's bringing them here and

22:43

creating them in

22:45

Printify and then obviously

22:47

pushing all of that to Etsy , and then we've got some really

22:49

nice listing photos that we include in that

22:52

and they're

22:54

starting to sell . So we sold that and I sold another

22:56

one for three the other day , and

22:59

it's only October 15th , so I

23:01

could see a lot of these getting sold more

23:05

and more as the holidays continue to get

23:07

closer and closer , so wanted to

23:09

let you know . So this is the page that you can

23:11

go to and you can get like a $69

23:14

, I'm sorry , $67 one-time

23:17

, lifetime access to Hello

23:19

Custom . If you're interested , you can go to printondemandcastcom

23:22

, slash Hello Custom and you'll get the

23:24

$67

23:26

deal . You'll never pay a monthly

23:29

subscription fee . I mean , it used to literally

23:31

be $30 a month , you know

23:33

so .

23:34

Yeah , that's wild .

23:35

Yeah , it's one-time fee $67

23:38

. And , uh , you can come here even

23:40

if you just want to look at the page and kind of watch the

23:42

video and , um , see

23:44

all this other stuff . Um , you

23:47

know , you can do all of that . Uh

23:49

, if you just go to again

23:51

print on demandcastcom slash , hello custom

23:53

. But yeah , that's . Uh , that

23:56

is the point

23:59

of interest really . I just thought it was nice really

24:01

cool .

24:04

It's just really yeah , that that , yeah

24:06

, and it's a crazy . When you told me

24:08

the lifetime cost , I was like did you say

24:10

67 ? Because that's just a

24:12

wildly inexpensive for

24:15

something that could benefit , that could generate so

24:17

much income for you . Um

24:19

, that's huge , that's a massive

24:21

uh benefit

24:24

?

24:24

yeah , and we're . I mean , we're doing ornaments

24:26

right now , but you could , you know , obviously

24:28

do , um , you know we're gonna , as

24:31

soon as christmas is kind of winding down , we're

24:33

gonna shift our focus to more , yeah

24:35

, uh , like mugs and things like that

24:38

, because you know , valentine's

24:40

day is coming up , um , as

24:42

is , uh , you know , mother's

24:44

day , all those holidays , you know

24:46

it's a very customized

24:49

. I mean , we talk about it all the time . If you can personalize

24:51

something , you can a charge more for

24:53

it and b you can probably sell

24:55

more . So , yep

24:58

, yeah , so that's the uh , so check

25:00

it out for this week .

25:01

Print on a man , gascom slash hello

25:03

custom if you are interested . But

25:05

it looks like it's a super cool , so it's

25:07

one of those things . I'm like man , that'd have been cool if that

25:09

existed when we were selling on etsy

25:12

. For sure , yeah

25:14

, but you know , I guess uh , ai was just a

25:16

little late to the game for us or we were late

25:18

to the game . Early to the game Doesn't

25:20

matter . Either way didn't exist . Wish it did and

25:23

you can have it . Put it on demandcastcom

25:25

. Slash hello custom is where you

25:27

can go . So with that we're going to go

25:29

into this week's main

25:31

event . Main

25:47

event main event main event

25:50

it's

25:53

a pretty cheery bumper for

25:55

a subject about the downside

25:57

of pod , uh

25:59

, but we do it again . So we

26:01

talk a lot about . You know , last week

26:03

was consistency . We talked a lot about like the positive

26:05

things , obviously to keep you going

26:07

motivated . But there are some things to keep

26:09

in mind about pod that we I think

26:11

we've called it before like the seedy underbelly

26:14

of pod , which is very much more of like a murder

26:16

mystery vibe , um , that would have fit the

26:18

other bumper , um , but nonetheless

26:20

, um , there's just some stuff

26:22

that you have to keep in mind . That's , I guess , like a classic

26:24

pro and cons list . I just watched that episode of the

26:26

office where jim was making pro and cons lists and

26:28

that's kind of what this is like . We tell you a lot about

26:31

the pros . There could be some cons

26:33

that you want to keep in mind . So so we have a list

26:35

here . Is it exhaustive ? No , is it informative

26:38

? Yes , so we're going to start

26:40

at the top here with lower

26:42

profit margins . So , travis , talk

26:51

a little bit about what that downside means when we talk about lower

26:53

profit margins and why it's something to kind of keep in

26:55

mind when venturing into POD .

26:56

Yeah , I mean , um , when you're comparing , obviously

26:59

lower profit margins is kind of subjective

27:01

to uh , you know what you're comparing

27:04

it to . But yeah , typically when we're

27:06

talking about printing , um

27:08

, you know , most people think when you talk

27:10

about like garment printing

27:12

or apparel decoration , they think

27:14

of screen printing . And you

27:16

, pod products are one-offs versus

27:19

most screen printing . It doesn't

27:21

make sense really , until you get to

27:23

, you know , 24

27:25

or more , really more

27:28

like you know , it's really starts to get really

27:30

efficient after you get over a hundred

27:32

, you know , and so um it

27:35

. When you're talking about , when you're comparing it

27:37

to that , I mean there's

27:39

no economy of scale in print

27:41

on demand , because every single print uses

27:43

the same amount of ink

27:46

, give or take , and it takes the same

27:48

amount of time , give or take . You

27:50

don't have the economies of scale

27:52

that you do with screen printing , because you're doing the same

27:55

design over and over , do a screen printing because

27:57

you're doing the same design over and over and you just , you know that's

28:02

. They have these automatic screen printing machines that we see at printing United and , uh , you know the

28:04

impression show that are just bam , bam bam and they're just , you know , printing 400

28:07

, 500 , 600 garments

28:09

an hour , you know , and all they have is somebody loading

28:12

a shirt and they have another guy taking

28:14

the shirt off , you know , and it's

28:16

and that's it . And so

28:18

there's just a lot more when it comes to

28:20

print on demand , because every design is different

28:22

. So you have to , you know theoretically load

28:24

that design . You know , if you're

28:26

, even if you're just doing screen

28:29

printed transfers , you know you still have to pull

28:32

the thing out , load the shirt . You know . Line

28:34

up the transfer or whatever . Push it

28:36

in , pull it down the

28:39

shirt . You know , line up the transfer or whatever . Push it in , pull it

28:41

down . You know there are some , some automatic . You know they use

28:43

air pressure , you know like and

28:46

they don't like want to go down , and

28:48

then you can be loading the other

28:50

side and then it'll

28:52

pop , and then it'll come over and

28:55

and then you can pull this one and do this , you

28:57

know . So I mean there are some efficiencies that are happening

28:59

, um , along , you know , with screen

29:02

printed transfer and even dtf

29:04

, since deep direct to film printing

29:06

has gotten more and more popular

29:08

, a lot more people are investing

29:10

in efficiencies for doing transfers

29:12

because it , uh , that

29:14

is lowering the cost , you know , but still

29:16

, ultimately print

29:19

on demand , the way we're talking about it . You

29:21

know you're going through a Printful or a Printify

29:24

. There's no way you're going to get the same pricing

29:26

that you're going to get if you had , you

29:29

know , if you ordered . You know 40 shirts , you

29:31

know , of this design . Even if there were multiple sizes , they're still

29:33

the same design . And then you did 40 shirts of this one and of of this design

29:36

. Even if there are multiple sizes , they're still the same

29:38

design . And then you did 40 shirts of this

29:40

one and 40 shirts of this one and 40 shirts of this one . Your

29:42

cost per garment is going to be really low . Now

29:45

, is that going to sell through ? I don't know . You

29:47

better have really good marketing and you better have a really good

29:49

design . Um so , and that's

29:51

the challenge , there in lies the rub . Right

29:54

, you pay more for the lower

29:56

risk that you're taking , but

29:58

, yes , definitely lower

30:01

profit margins . If

30:03

you're comparing screen printing

30:05

, specifically buying in bulk

30:08

, to print on demand , buying

30:10

one at a time .

30:11

Yeah , the second one

30:13

on the list is longer shipping

30:16

times , because obviously

30:18

the

30:26

second one on the list is longer shipping times , because obviously some POD

30:28

providers can take longer to fulfill and ship the orders than traditional

30:30

retailers , just because it takes time for the product to be produced , and that's something

30:32

that I remember specifically especially . We talk a lot about the age of , like

30:34

, amazon Prime , where people are like , hey , can I get this in two days or can

30:36

I get this next day one day Prime , two days or can I get this next

30:38

day one day prime ? And and the people have been kind of conditioned to that just being the

30:41

default delivery time of some things , without understanding like , yeah

30:43

, we're not that , we're a mom and pop shop

30:45

in Colorado that it's going to take

30:47

time . We have to produce it or we have to . Our our

30:49

print partner has to produce it , and

30:51

so that's one thing that can can be

30:53

you just have to keep in mind because it can lead to customer

30:56

dissatisfaction at times can

30:59

be , you have to keep in mind because it can lead to customer dissatisfaction at times .

31:00

Yeah , I mean anytime . Like you said , they've been conditioned to two

31:02

days . Um , you know , delivery

31:05

times keeps getting getting lower and lower and

31:07

the only way you can combat that is if you

31:09

do the , you know , go the timu route and

31:11

like , charge three dollars for

31:13

something , then people will be okay waiting

31:16

two to three weeks , you know , know , but , um

31:18

, there's no profit in that for us

31:20

, you know , for , uh , you know , people who

31:22

are in the U S anyway . Um

31:24

, first of all , we can't even ship it to you for $3,

31:27

. You know , alone produce

31:29

it and , you know , take the time to make it and

31:31

et cetera , et cetera . So , um

31:33

, yeah , so people want to get it

31:35

super fast , and so the

31:38

problem with print on demand , you know , I mean , think

31:40

about every other uh retailer

31:43

. You know we have to go get the blank , bring

31:45

it , you know , bring

32:00

it over to the printer , find the file , put

32:02

it through the pretreatment machine , you know , or whatever

32:05

, and then print it and then dry

32:07

it and then it's ready . So

32:09

there's definitely a longer time

32:11

than most . Even the screen printing

32:14

guy , you know , screen printing already printed them

32:16

all and they're just sitting on a shelf so you can

32:18

just go and grab it and ship it . So typically

32:21

, print on demand does give

32:24

you longer shipping times just because of the fact

32:26

that it has to be produced .

32:28

Yeah , the next one on the list higher

32:31

competition , which I

32:33

mean I guess it's kind of like anything I know

32:36

in Amazon . When you first got into Amazon it was

32:38

great because there's you know , if you're an early adopter

32:40

of selling on Amazon , but this

32:43

is getting more and more saturated in

32:45

terms of POD platforms . But

32:48

you can make it challenging to stand out because

32:50

it's a low barrier of entry that can

32:52

lead to , like , the flood of similar products

32:54

. And I think another thing that is contributing

32:56

to that barrier of entry is , I

33:01

mean , you've seen the videos just as well as I have , dear listener , and it's like

33:03

hey , I'm , I'll teach you how to go from zero to six figures in six months

33:05

using pod . And so people are just flooding

33:07

these platforms because they're they're

33:09

being sold to them as a get rich

33:11

quick platform or scheme or what

33:14

have you , but nonetheless , the

33:16

result's the same . There's a

33:18

lot of people doing a lot

33:20

of the same thing , which is why it's

33:22

important for you to figure out how

33:24

to stand out . I've shared the story a

33:26

thousand times about my father-in-law wanting to start

33:28

a novelty t-shirt website just because

33:31

we had the assets available to us , and it's

33:33

like cool , but

33:35

like what ? How are we going to be different from all of the other

33:37

ones that have already been doing this for 10 years ? Right

33:40

, how do you stand out ? So that's

33:42

part of the discussion . What you've got to think about is

33:45

how can I stand out , because people are

33:47

going to come on the platforms

33:49

and it's going to get more saturated . It's

33:51

going to happen , but how do I differentiate

33:54

myself so that , even though that is happening , I'm

33:56

not worried about them taking my market share , because

33:58

I've really defined the niche

34:01

or defined what it is that I'm offering

34:03

on those platforms ?

34:05

Yeah , I mean

34:08

one way is through niche , another way is through

34:10

products . You know there are some pretty

34:12

cool and unique products out there

34:15

that not everybody's necessarily

34:17

doing , some pretty cool and unique products out there that not everybody's

34:19

necessarily doing . And so maybe you know , considering , going

34:21

and figuring out cause it can

34:23

be hard work to like

34:25

figure out a new vendor , you

34:27

know , and then figuring out a new

34:29

vendors , the way they

34:31

want the files , and but

34:34

there's , there's some cool products out there that not

34:36

a lot of people are necessarily offering and

34:39

if , if it works with your niche , um

34:41

, you know that that can really

34:44

go a long way towards um

34:46

, helping you stand out , like Josiah

34:48

is saying .

34:51

Absolutely . Next on this list

34:53

is quality control

34:55

issues . Um , if you're

34:58

using a drop shipper , you don't really handle

35:00

the products before they're shipped , so

35:02

there's a risk of those of those qc

35:04

issues happening , um , like either , you

35:07

know , misaligned prints or damaged products

35:09

or colors not the same

35:11

as it looked on the site . Um

35:13

, it's , it's something that

35:15

it's's going to happen

35:17

and we've talked about this before . The way

35:20

to preempt that is , you

35:22

know , get samples and at

35:24

least know as much as you can about

35:26

what it is . Your , your provider

35:29

is going to be selling you , um

35:31

, or not selling you , but selling on your behalf

35:33

, creating on your behalf . Um

35:35

, because the customer is not going to care that

35:39

you didn't handle the product . They're going to want answers

35:41

and mistakes happen . But

35:43

in this instance , when you're dropshipping , you don't

35:45

have a lot of control over knowing

35:48

if you'll be surprised most of the time , but

35:50

that the mistakes did happen . But how do you figure

35:52

that out ? How do you navigate that ? Because

35:54

you're not the ones actually with hands on the product .

35:57

Yeah , how do you navigate that Cause you're

35:59

not the ones actually with hands on the product

36:01

. Yeah , I actually shared . Let me see if I can share this

36:03

really quick . The see

36:07

here . I shared this in our newsletter

36:11

, I

36:15

think it was two weeks ago . Let's see

36:17

here . Let's

36:23

see if I can share this . Yeah , this amazing little coffee mug that

36:26

got sent to my customer Nice

36:28

. And for those of you who can't see it , it's actually

36:30

upside down . So I think

36:33

the print is upside down , and so I had to take a picture

36:35

of it to get a refund from my vendor .

36:37

So you could enjoy it while you're drinking it

36:39

See so it's right side , up to you , and you're

36:41

tipping the cup .

36:43

Apparently that's probably what it was , but

36:45

I mean , that's such a perfect example of

36:47

this , you know , you just you don't touch the inventory

36:50

. And so I mean , to be

36:52

fair , when I did have a print

36:54

company , you know , like when we were actually

36:56

fulfilling all of these orders , that would

36:58

still happen , but most

37:00

, most of the time , we catch

37:02

it before we sent it out , you know , and so

37:04

, but I'll bet

37:06

there were a few times that it went out and it was , you

37:09

know , upside down or crooked or whatever

37:11

. But you know , having it

37:13

all in house , you know , can can

37:15

help you with some of those quality control issues , and

37:17

most people that are doing print on demand they

37:20

don't have it in-house and so therefore , this

37:23

can become an issue . So you really

37:25

want to make sure , um , a , you

37:27

got a good print vendor and B , you got a print

37:29

vendor that's going to like , own up

37:31

to their mistakes if they screw up

37:33

, you know . So , uh , luckily

37:36

we do , we use Guten , and

37:38

they're like , yep , sorry , we'll redo

37:40

this . As a matter of fact , just the other day there

37:42

was one that was kind of blurry and

37:45

the customer sent it back and

37:47

cause it . It's what's called

37:49

ghosting , when the

37:51

transfer paper kind of moves while

37:53

it's still sublimating , and

37:56

that happened . A customer sent it back and

37:58

Guten back , and I took a picture of it and Guten

38:00

said , yep , we'll refund that , so sorry . So

38:03

yeah , just make sure

38:05

you have a good front vendor and if they make

38:07

a mistake they'll own it .

38:09

Yeah , next one on the

38:11

list is inconsistent

38:13

inventory Hello 2020

38:15

. Pod suppliers run out of

38:17

stock , uh , and

38:20

they discontinue certain products without notice

38:22

, so you really have to keep a monitor on

38:25

what is available to

38:27

you . Don't just assume that

38:29

you know the toltex 202 is always going

38:31

to be the toltex 202 , because it

38:33

won't always be that and then it

38:35

won't even exist anymore . It doesn't even exist

38:37

anymore , which was sad . They were my favorite

38:39

supplier just because they were local and they were close . But

38:42

you can't just it's not always

38:44

a set it and forget it scenario because things

38:46

could be discontinued , contracts with

38:48

brands could fall through with these

38:50

suppliers , who knows ? There's a myriad of reasons

38:52

why inventory

38:55

can be inconsistent , and

38:57

so , again , talking about 2020

38:59

, covid was the epitome

39:02

of out of stock

39:04

from a manufacturer level , not

39:07

just like a supplier level , but

39:09

a manufacturer level where there was just so much that

39:11

was not available . And

39:13

so , to the extent where we added a

39:15

segment to this show that was

39:17

temporary , just called , called Apparel Rants , because

39:20

we would just vent

39:22

to each other about

39:24

the nonsense that

39:26

was happening during that time , I

39:28

feel like we need to play that bumper , though when is it

39:30

?

39:31

I don't see it .

39:31

That's the Equipment Rants . We

39:34

never made them for apparel . We have them for equipment , though . Huh , we never made them for apparel .

39:37

We have them for equipment , though . Oh , we probably

39:39

. It was probably before we were using it in here and we just had

39:41

like a . I was just recording

39:43

it into audio . That's

39:45

sad . Well , it

39:48

went like . This apparel rants . Okay

39:50

, that's that's how it went , yeah

39:53

.

39:53

All that time searching for a button , and you could have

39:55

just done it .

39:58

Fair . No , I was going

40:00

to say with the since consistent . Just

40:02

one more point on the inconsistent inventory . Even

40:04

right now we've

40:07

gotten in the . Over the last couple of weeks I've

40:09

gotten like some notifications

40:11

from some of the print on demand vendors that it's like

40:13

hey , some of our stuff , uh

40:16

, is affected by the hurricanes you know

40:18

, and and the storms that are happening and

40:20

so you just don't know , because

40:22

you don't hold it and you don't even necessarily

40:25

all the time . you don't necessarily

40:27

know where your vendors are located

40:29

. You don't know what's gonna . You know

40:31

, is it going to be her , you know hurricanes

40:38

in the South or tornadoes in the Midwest , or you know , I don't know , like

40:40

earthquakes in California or whatever . You just don't necessarily

40:43

know what's going on with

40:46

your print vendor and how that's going to potentially affect either their ability to produce , which

40:48

is kind of the case right now , or like in 2020 , a global pandemic , where it's

40:50

going to potentially affect either their ability to produce , which is kind

40:52

of the case right now , or like in

40:54

2020 , a global pandemic

40:56

where it's going to affect their ability to even get

40:58

the product in the first place so they can decorate it for

41:00

you and send it to your customer .

41:02

Yeah , yeah , it

41:04

was a hard time Just across the board

41:06

, obviously in 2020 . Apparel rants , apparel

41:09

rants , it's over , until

41:11

next time . Apparel rants , apparel rants , it's over , until next time

41:13

. Next one is complex international

41:16

shipping . Now

41:26

, travis , I know this is something that you have had plenty

41:29

of frustrating experiences over in the days of

41:31

wanting to sell internationally . But there's a

41:33

whole other list of rules when it comes to international selling and

41:35

it usually varies by country , and you gots to know

41:37

, because if you don't , it's gonna

41:39

suck . So talk a little bit about that , travis . Like the difference

41:41

is how that can be a downside

41:44

, because you think , like , I'm expanding internationally

41:46

, that's obviously a good thing , which it is , yeah

41:48

, but there's some logistic the devil's

41:50

in the details , right ? Yeah , so there's

41:52

some . There's some issues you need to be aware of

41:55

.

41:55

Uh , when you expand , yeah

41:57

, I think you know one thing is just

41:59

understanding that it's

42:01

going to cost more to get your stuff where it needs to go

42:04

a lot of the times , um , and

42:06

you know , to be fair , like there

42:08

are print-on-dem demand companies that are remedying

42:11

this and but

42:13

even then it's still a challenge . So , like back

42:15

in 2018 , 2019

42:17

, I was selling on Amazon

42:20

, selling in Europe on

42:22

Amazon , and I was using printful

42:25

for that side , you know , for

42:27

those sales that were happening in Europe

42:29

. And then anything that would happen in the U S , we would

42:31

fulfill ourselves . And I

42:34

just remember like , first

42:36

of all , a lot of those , um

42:39

, a lot of those orders , for

42:41

whatever reason , would get lost

42:43

. You know , they'd never make it and I was always

42:45

like , why ? You know , because every

42:47

country has a different format for putting

42:50

their uh address in , and

42:52

sometimes Printful would be like this

42:54

isn't a real address and I'm like , well , the customer

42:57

gave it to us . Of course it's a real address

42:59

, let's figure it out . So I'd have to sometimes

43:01

cancel orders . But

43:03

even then , the VAT

43:05

tax , I was never able

43:07

. It's like , hey , I'm reselling this , why do

43:09

I have to pay tax on it ? I

43:12

never understood , but

43:14

there's like a 20% tax

43:16

on me , you know , and and

43:18

the customers , it's just

43:20

weird , it's just different , it's not like

43:22

my brand and and I know , I

43:25

know some of our listeners from you

43:27

know , from Europe and from the UK

43:29

and they're , you know , they're all like , oh , travis

43:31

, you just it's , it's so easy

43:33

, it's so simple , because it's just a , b , c , d . And

43:40

it makes total sense to you because you've lived in that country . For , however , yeah

43:42

, you understand it , it's just a day you know day to day of , or it's

43:44

just another day in your life where

43:46

me from the U ? S it's like so outside

43:49

of my , you know , in the U .

43:50

S your grid .

43:51

You have no grid for I have

43:53

a sales tax license and I don't pay sales tax on

43:55

things I resell period . But why

43:57

am I getting taxed on these European ? So understanding

44:01

that kind of thing makes a little

44:03

bit , you know , challenging and

44:05

so , and then the other thing is is like , does

44:07

your vendor even have a facility

44:09

that's close enough to that particular

44:12

country or that where the sale actually

44:14

happened , that you're not going to pay a stupid

44:17

amount to get it there , you know ? And

44:19

so it's kind of like uh

44:21

, you know it's buyer beware , slash

44:23

lister beware , you know . Print on

44:26

demand , business owner beware . Yeah , make sure

44:28

that you know how much you're going to spend If somebody , if you are

44:30

listing internationally how much somebody's , how much you're going

44:32

to spend if somebody , if you are listing

44:34

internationally how much somebody's , how

44:36

much it's going to cost you to get it to that person and

44:38

then change your prices accordingly

44:40

on those international or charge enough shipping

44:42

that it's going to cover you no matter what

44:44

, because there have been times when

44:47

I have lost money shipping internationally

44:49

because I didn't cover

44:52

my butt , you know , with my shipping charge

44:54

. So I learned really quick and it didn't

44:56

happen again . But you get the idea it's

44:58

only going to happen once and

45:01

you're going to stop shipping . Yeah , you're either going

45:03

to stop shipping internationally or you're going to raise that

45:05

international shipping price . So just understand

45:07

that that can be an issue and it

45:09

can be a challenge , and it's something that you just need to address .

45:12

Yeah , next one on the

45:14

list , as we almost are done

45:16

. Second to last here branding

45:18

limitations , and I think that's something

45:20

we've talked about too . Here is you know , a lot of the pod

45:23

platforms have some restrictions on

45:25

adding custom branding elements or custom

45:27

packaging or inserts or labels . So

45:30

if you're trying to start a brand

45:32

and

45:34

have a particular aesthetic or a particular look

45:37

and design above and beyond just

45:39

what's on your shirts , if you're wanting more of an experience

45:41

, a customer experience beyond just purchasing

45:44

your shirt , some

45:46

of the POD platforms might not be the

45:48

best solution for

45:51

you , but all

45:53

that to say's still . You know , print on demand fulfillment

45:56

providers that can partner with a um

45:58

, a shopify or a third-party site

46:00

, which is a whole another ball of wax when you're talking

46:02

about marketing and again cutting through the noise

46:05

, um , but just know that

46:07

don't don't expect to be able to customize

46:09

the customer experience , uh

46:11

, beyond their ability to , you know , customize

46:14

their shirt or purchase

46:16

your item and Travis

46:18

, you were saying that Printful is kind of

46:20

making strides to to remedy this

46:23

kind of issue as far

46:25

as lack of branding .

46:27

There are companies that , like Printful

46:29

, that will allow you to put

46:32

a custom insert in in in the in

46:34

your package . Um , you can

46:36

customize your labels , you know

46:38

, and it's all for a fee , um

46:40

, but you know , like we , we used

46:43

to fulfill for a company , for a brand that

46:45

really wanted to make sure that that

46:48

brand or that experience was

46:50

really great for their customer , and so they

46:53

, uh , they wanted to go as far as having

46:56

us get um mailers

46:58

for them that , oh , we only used

47:00

for them and we said no to

47:02

that because , again , we are doing

47:04

mass production . Now we did . Eventually

47:07

, they , they sent us a bunch of stickers and

47:09

for an extra buck , we threw stickers in

47:11

. You know that they had produced

47:14

and they sent to us and we put those

47:16

in so the customer would have a sticker

47:18

, you know , with their brand name on it and

47:21

so some print on demand . Companies

47:23

are getting better at this . You

47:26

know you can do some . You know

47:28

, I know MerchEyes

47:30

has some

47:32

box options that you

47:34

can figure out . You can print a

47:36

box basically to go with certain products

47:39

, not all their products . So

47:41

they're understanding that this is a pain

47:43

point specifically for brands

47:45

. I think the

47:48

other thing Printful does , and maybe

47:50

Printify , I can't quite remember . I'm

47:52

sure people are yelling at their radio right now or

47:54

their stereos .

47:55

Their radio .

47:57

They have a radio in their car . I know

47:59

they're playing it through Bluetooth

48:02

.

48:02

Okay , I'm

48:04

stupid . Oh boy , next time I'm going to put on a main

48:06

cast radio .

48:11

Will Travis have another point of ?

48:12

interest .

48:13

Turn it next time anyway

48:17

, I , I think it might be , I don't know , but I

48:20

know you can do um with certain

48:22

. I think printful allows you to do like custom

48:24

neck labels on t-shirts and

48:26

you know garments like that too , again

48:28

for an extra , you know

48:30

fee um , but I , by

48:32

the time you do all of that , you know

48:34

you , you better have a really good

48:36

brand presence because you're going to be paying a lot for

48:39

that shirt , you know , or for that whatever , by

48:41

the time you do all that stuff . But I think that's the idea

48:43

is that it's such a premium experience

48:46

but you're never going to be able to to

48:49

personalize it or

48:51

really brand

48:53

it to the point that you could , if you were doing

48:55

it all in house and it was your product

48:57

and maybe you had it screen printed , but you had

48:59

those custom labels done and and you

49:01

have it all sitting on the shelf and you bought the

49:04

, the custom uh packaging

49:06

and you've got the stickers right there and every

49:08

order comes through and you're doing , you know doing

49:10

the thing that is that's

49:13

a whole nother deal . But that's not print on demand

49:16

, that's buying in bulk and crossing

49:18

your fingers that they'll sell . John

49:21

.

49:21

Greenewald . Yeah , yep . The last one

49:23

on the list is customer

49:26

service control . We talked about quality control

49:28

, but now you're talking about customer service control

49:30

. So , since the production and shipping processes

49:32

are managed by obviously not you and

49:34

your production partner and your provider

49:37

, any issues , delays , returns

49:39

, product defects might be out

49:41

of your control . In terms of the

49:44

process , what they're recommending , what they're

49:46

, what they accept , what they don't accept , what

49:48

it looks like to initiate a return , and

49:50

again , we've talked about this before of

49:53

really educating yourself on what that

49:55

process is so that you can speak intelligently

49:57

to your customer , at least have an idea of

50:00

what they can expect in that process

50:02

. And when you're looking for a provider , really digging

50:04

into those questions of how does your return process

50:07

work , how does it work if something's defective Because

50:10

you're gonna again , the customer is going to want to hear

50:12

from you and it's the the

50:14

worst feeling when

50:16

you are the middleman , left in

50:18

the lurch with really no control over the

50:21

solution or or how expedient

50:23

the solution can happen . Um , you're

50:25

at kind of the mercy of your provider . Um

50:28

, and travis , I know you've had experience with that

50:30

with with some wine tumblers recently

50:32

. Yeah , all right , you know . So talk a little

50:34

bit about that .

50:36

Yeah , it's not necessarily just

50:38

the process of like returns and

50:40

stuff , but it's also the process of like the cancellation

50:43

. You know like what is when

50:45

is too late to send this product . And so

50:47

what happened with the wine tumblers was during

50:49

this , during the hurricanes . It's

50:51

very recent um , our

50:54

, uh , our vendor

50:57

of guten's vendor for black

50:59

wine tumblers , um

51:01

, they were unable to get

51:03

a new shipment and it was partially

51:06

because the shipment was delayed by the manufacturer

51:08

, but then it was even as it was on

51:10

its way . They like delayed it even further

51:12

because of the hurricanes . And meanwhile

51:15

my customer is sitting there twiddling

51:17

their thumbs and saying , hey , I have an event on October

51:19

I think it was October , like

51:23

right around now , like 12th or 13th or something

51:25

and they were like

51:27

hey , what's going on ? And so I

51:30

reached out to Guten . We found out that

51:32

this whole thing was happening . So I

51:34

was I was able to work with this customer and

51:36

cancel that order and have

51:38

them reorder white , because the client

51:41

had or I mean , the vendor had white

51:43

, white and tumblers , and so we just changed

51:45

the color . Um , but I had to immediately

51:48

go in and like turn off all of the

51:50

black wine tumblers , um , on

51:53

all of our listings until I hear

51:55

you know that they're back in stock yeah

51:57

you know , and so that that's it

51:59

is . It's not just quality control . It's

52:02

like you again , it's like it's just

52:04

out of your hands , but that feeling

52:06

of like being that middleman

52:09

and you're just waiting on your vendor's answer

52:11

with bated breath and , you know , hoping

52:13

that they get back to you before

52:15

your customer is just really , really

52:17

upset and you're like hoping that you

52:20

know Amazon or Etsy doesn't come down on you

52:22

in the meantime while you're waiting . And

52:24

you know , so that is a downside

52:26

. You are the middleman essentially when

52:28

you're relying on these print on demand companies

52:31

to ship your stuff for you . And

52:33

yeah , and you don't know each channel

52:36

. You know amazon , walmart , etsy

52:38

, shopify shopify is different because

52:40

it's really your channel , but all

52:42

of these they have different , like you said , they have different

52:44

customer service expectations

52:47

and so what does that look like ? Um

52:50

, in this particular instance ? And

52:52

you , it definitely hurt my metrics to

52:54

have to cancel after like almost two

52:56

weeks of waiting , but

52:59

in the end I was able to serve

53:01

the customer and I still saved the sale . But

53:04

you know , it definitely hurt my metrics and

53:07

there's nothing I can do about it . I

53:09

had to cancel another order too and say I didn't

53:11

have any inventory . That was another one

53:13

that had come in , uh , before

53:15

I was able to , you know , unlist

53:17

all of the black wine tumblers .

53:19

So right , just sucked , man

53:21

, just really sucked yeah , the

53:23

ripple effects can be really wide

53:27

, like the effects of those kinds of things , like you said

53:29

, not just to cancel it , not just returns and

53:31

defects , but canceling

53:33

orders and the delays and , yeah , all of that

53:35

just plays into into that . So that

53:38

wraps up the main event portion

53:40

, uh , the list that we have . If you have any other

53:42

thoughts or questions , or maybe you have

53:44

another uh downside that maybe we haven't

53:46

thought of , we have a story about experiencing

53:49

one of these downsides and how you overcame it . What

53:51

happened ? We'd love to hear from you

53:53

. Of course you can go to the Facebook group or

53:55

you can reply to the weekly email

53:58

that is sent out to you , which , if you're

54:00

not subscribed to that , it's printondemandcastcom

54:02

slash VIP and it

54:04

is filled with tips , tricks and

54:06

an extra dad joke that you

54:08

don't hear on the show . So avail

54:10

yourself of that . But before we get out of

54:12

here in totality , travis

54:14

, you had a challenge that you gave

54:16

to the listening audience last

54:18

week , so talk a little bit

54:20

about that and let's check in and see how they're doing

54:22

.

54:23

Yeah , last week we were talking about consistency and

54:25

, you know , as a result

54:28

, I kind of challenged everybody . I was like

54:30

, hey , let's see how you , how , let's , let's put

54:32

five listings up a day . Maybe

54:34

, maybe you could choose to back it off to three

54:36

, you know , or whatever . Um , or

54:39

do 10 , you know , just to whatever you

54:41

wanted to do . But , um , I created

54:43

a like a kind

54:46

of a tracker , a weekly listing , creation

54:48

tracker that , um , several of you downloaded

54:51

. But

54:53

, um , if you were , if you weren't aware of it , or you forgot

54:55

to download it , or whatever , you can go to print on demandcastcom

54:57

slash listing , dash

55:00

tracker . And again , that'll be

55:02

in the show notes . But it's a free , it's

55:04

just a Google sheet . You can copy it , put

55:06

it in your Google drive and then you can enter

55:08

in how many you want to try to . You

55:10

know , attempt to do that week , and then it'll extrapolate

55:13

how many that means per day and

55:16

then you can actually enter

55:18

in how many you're doing a day . But I'd love to

55:20

hear if you actually did

55:23

download that then you actually are

55:25

using it . How'd you do , how'd you

55:27

do in the last week ? Or

55:29

maybe you started it on Monday or whatever

55:31

. How are things going ? Please

55:33

reach out to me and , uh , let

55:35

me know , post in the Facebook group

55:38

. You know , do a screenshot of your first week

55:40

. Um , you know , post that in there

55:42

or whatever . Send it to me . Uh , info at

55:44

print on demandcastcom . Um , or

55:46

yeah , so would love to hear how that's

55:49

going . And again , if you haven't started and

55:51

you want to jump in on that challenge

55:53

to get more listings up there

55:55

for Q4 , then

55:58

go download that tracker . Hopefully

56:00

that'll help you . And

56:03

yeah , I'd love to hear some wins . You

56:06

know some consistency

56:09

happening in our print-on , print

56:11

on demand cast community .

56:13

Yeah , that's awesome . So again , let Travis know how

56:15

you're doing or , as Australians

56:18

say , how you going . I don't know how you're going

56:20

on that and which is

56:22

really weird slang they're . They're

56:24

all very strange slang . Sorry to

56:27

our Australian fans .

56:29

Their slang is lost . We just lost

56:31

all of those australian listeners

56:33

. Way to go um .

56:35

Yeah , my fault . My parting gift

56:37

to you uh so thank

56:39

you guys so much for listening and

56:42

again , thank you , uh again for

56:44

the constant support over the last 218

56:47

episodes . Uh means the

56:49

world to me and I will miss all of you

56:51

, but , like I said , I'll still be . I'll be

56:53

watching from a distance and so , uh

56:56

, and supporting and a silent supporter , but look

56:58

forward again to the time , whenever that might be

57:00

, that I pop back on and say hello . But

57:02

thank you , guys so much for your support

57:04

and for listening . So until

57:07

next time and for the last time , I'm

57:09

josiah and for I

57:12

totally botched that just now can you imagine

57:14

? can you imagine it was so

57:17

good and then I just

57:19

straight up ruined it anyway

57:23

? Yep , uh , true

57:25

, yeah , that's exactly what I was

57:27

looking for . I know you were . I couldn't

57:29

find it . I was looking for the outro button and

57:31

I was looking for to say all the things and try it

57:33

and have it be heartfelt . Anyway , like I was saying

57:35

, but until next time , for the last

57:37

time for Travis , I'm Josiah , we'll see you next

57:40

time right here on the print on demand cast

57:42

. See ya .

57:46

Hey babe , thanks for listening to this week's

57:48

episode of the print on demand cast . We

57:51

hope you enjoyed the Totally Tubular Show

57:53

. If you've got a question or a suggestion for

57:55

the show , send Travis and Josiah an email

57:57

at info at printondemandcastcom

58:00

. Want to be wicked nice ? Take

58:02

a minute to rate and review the show on iTunes

58:04

or wherever you get your podcasts , and

58:06

don't forget to subscribe now so you don't

58:08

miss next week's episode . See you next

58:11

time , for sure .