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HOW TO START A PRINTING BUSINESS WITH NO EQUIPMENT
Everyone in any business, especially mail order, needs printing.
But being a printer takes huge, expensive printing presses, long
hours and messy work, right? WRONG. YOU can make money without
the mess and expense by being a PRINTING BROKER.
A printing broker is, basically, an order taker for one or more
commercial printers. You take orders for anything from business
cards to circulars to large printing orders, take your agreed
upon commission, then pass on the order to the printer. The
printer then does the job and ships the order back to you or your
customer, depending on your arrangements. Because the printer
won't insert any of his or her literature in with the job, YOU
will get the return orders and commissions. You can even insert
some of your circulars for your other products and services with
the job, saving your mailing costs.
Here's what you need to do... Prepare a letter explaining your
desire to become a broker and mail it to all the printers in your
area. The smaller printers seem to be the most likely to work
well with you on this. Set up a time to meet with any printers
who are interested. During this meeting, explain exactly what
you will be doing (selling printing jobs by mail through
advertisements in mail order publications). You won't have to
explain much because almost all printers are familiar with
brokering. Usually, you should be able to get a 20% - 30%
commission agreement, though it may depend upon the competition
in your area between printers. You should be able to find
printers interested in working with you, though, even those who
already have brokers.
Printing is a very competitive business and printers always want
more work. So, you should have no trouble setting up
connections. One good printer is all you need, though being set
up with more than one may be an advantage (one may be cheaper for
business cards than the other, who may be cheaper at single sheet
printing).
Try to get a price list of YOUR costs drawn up by each printer.
This will help you if someone needs a price quote on a job.
Also, you can check the mail order publications and see what
other printers are charging. If you can undercut them and still
keep a good margin (which you should be able to do, easily), you
can make good money in this business.
Another good idea... Instead of a commission, you may want to
set up a "work account" with the printer, and get your printing
done for free! Printers hate to have "down time," where their
presses aren't printing anything. Work out an arrangement where
you will have flyers, circulars, ad sheets or whatever, ready to
be printed whenever the printer has down time. Turn over the
full amount of orders you receive, instead of taking your
commission, and get your printing done free during this down
time! Most printers will be more than happy to take this
arrangement, and you can get great benefits from it!
Be sure your printer will be able to deliver QUALITY products ON
TIME. These are the two biggest considerations to keep in mind
when selecting a printer or printers to work with. Get samples
of their previous work. Talk to them about the importance of
being timely with the orders you bring in. Most printers will be
understanding of your concerns, and will do their best to keep
you happy, as you will be bringing in orders they otherwise
wouldn't have. You have the capability to bring your local
printer orders from across the country... building their
business while building yours! Printing brokering is an easy way
to expand your profits while expending little extra work.
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