Have you thought about starting a screen printing business? It costs almost nothing to start a t-shirt printing business at home. I read about one guy who started a screen printing business with almost nothing. He made the frames with used lumber, and used fabric from an old wedding dress for the screens. He printed and sold signs. He also printed magnets (like what you see on car doors advertising a company), shirts, and baseball caps. He actually designed and built his own 4 color screen printing press. I bought the plans for his 4 color screen printing press on eBay. The plans were hard to follow, but I managed to build my own modified version of his press.
At one point I seriously looked at starting my own screen printing business. I ultimately decided that there were other things I would rather do. So I mainly screen print t-shirts for fun. But it wouldn’t be that hard, or expensive to get into the screen printing business. It would cost under $100 to buy the stuff to screen print t-shirts. The absolute minimum stuff you would need would be a frame, photo emulsion, a cheap light, ink, a squeegee, masking tape, and t-shirts. For another hundred, you could buy a single shirt screen printing press. Or if you want to build your own press.
And you can upgrade your equipment as your business grows. Screen printing a t-shirt only uses pennies worth of ink for each shirt. You can get blank shirts on sale at Michaels for $3-4 each. Or you can buy them in quantity for less. You can buy box lots of t-shirts on eBay. You can run a screen printing business out of your garage, or the basement of your home. If you run a small shop, you will probably be okay. If you start to get bigger, then you might need to check with your local government on zoning laws.
What I have seen many people do is design and print shirts, and then sell them on eBay. If that is what you are interested in doing, look on eBay and find what kind of shirts people are buying. Are they buying dog shirts, cat shirts, karate shirts, etc. Find which shirts are selling. Develop your own original artwork, print a few shirts, and try listing them on eBay. So you might spend a few bucks per shirt, it only costs pennies to print them, and then you might be able to sell them on eBay for $10-$15 on eBay.
Some other screen printing business opportunities would be local rock bands, baseball teams, family reunions, etc. If you know someone who needs t-shirts, offer your services and make a small profit. It is important that you do a good quality job. After you have done some jobs, you will likely get referred business by word of mouth. You can always get some business cards printed up, and post them on bulletin boards in your area advertising custom printed t-shirts.
Rob Jacob has years of screen printing experience. For articles and information about screen printing t-shirts, visit: http://www.screen-printing-t-shirts.com
