Boosting Productivity and Margins

Tale of Two Shirts

How small differences can make a huge impact on your bottom line at the end of the year.

By Bill Hood

Hanging on the wall in the classroom at the School of Screenprinting are two black T-shirts with a simulated process print. During Printwear Show held March 24-26, 2011 in Austin, Texas, several thousand people came into the School of Screenprinting booth to judge the two shirts. Most people assumed that they are identical. They are not! In fact, they are considerably different.

DIFFERENCES
The shirt on the left was printed with a pass of white ink on head one, a flash on head two and a second hit of white on head three, followed by double stroking all the remaining colors. The press operators used 60 pounds of squeegee press which drove the first layer of ink into the wales of the material and thus had to follow with a flash and another hit to achieve opacity.

The shirt on the right was printed with single stroke of white ink and no flash. All other colors were single stroked and printed wet-on-wet.

INK COSTS
Let’s look at the cost difference in our ability to print with single stroke wet-on-wet printing and no of the flash to gel the inks.

Using a calibrated gram scale, the shirt on the left had 0.33 oz of ink on it. What is the cost of that 0.33 oz of ink? Ink is sold by the pound and a 10-pound (159.99 ounces) bucket of ink selling for just $60 USD works out to $0.1238 USD per print. Right away, we realize that our ink consumption on the shirt on the right was reduced by 50-percent to just $0.0619 per print.

If we were to save $0.0619 on every print produced in a year and run at just 400 shirts per hour, 5 days a week for 50 weeks, we could put an extra $30,937.50 in margins in our bank account.

Can any screenprinter afford not to consider this in their operation? But, wait, we are not through engineering the shirt on the right.

MESH COUNTS
And, for those who never hit a color twice, consider this tidbit about thread diameter and ink consumption: The difference in ink consumption between a 230-40 and 230-55 is 20.4-percent. Printing 514.29 shirts an hour the 20.4-percent cost savings in ink amount to $4,539.52 a year.

Yes, just small change in thread diameter of mesh can make a difference at the end of the year. But, wait, we are not though discussing the differences between the two shirts.

PRESS SPEED
The shirt on the left was printed at a speed of 400 shirts per hour (1 shirt every 9 seconds), while the one of the right was printed at 514.29 shirts per hour (1 shirt every 7 seconds) due to the reduction in time from avoiding the flash gel and single stroking the remaining colors.  That’s a 22-percent increase in production.

If you printed this type of work for a year, the results are interesting. In one year of printing (5-hour days for 50-weeks) at 400 shirts an hour, you would produce 500,000 shirts, but at 512.29 shirts an hour you would turn out 640,363 shirts. That’s an extra 140,363 shirts at $2.00 net each that would put an extra $280,725.00 of margin in your pocket.

This is of course only true if the work is available. However, I can assure you that there are shops that maintain that production year in and year out.

Many printers are producing more than 800 shirts per hour and some as high as 1200 shirts an hour. For the faster shops they would be producing 1.5 million shirts per week and this savings in time amounts to an extra $2 million dollars at $2.00 net.

THE SMART GET RICHER
And, that folks is how the large production shops carefully consider the smallest variables and yes, make more money.

LEARN TO THINK – THINK TO LEARN
Come to the School of Screenprint and learn how this is possible and much, much more. The workshops are held on weekends and cost only $495 to attend. Considering that the information above can put an extra $324.886.95 or more in your pocket – can you not afford to consider attending?

Okay, you are not a big production shop and are operating at just 10-percent of our example. That is still $32,488.69 a year in your pocket. And, the information will assist you in boosting your productivity and margins for as long as you are in business.