Zazzle Launches Custom Embroidery
ByAccording to TechCrunch, Zazzle is launching custom embroidery. Yes…. real honest-to-gosh embroidery.
The embroidery process should be fairly simple for users. Simply upload a design and choose how large you want it to appear on the clothing. Zazzle then uses a fairly complicated process behind the scenes to digitize the images and sew them onto items. Computers are being used to perform 50-70% of the digitization process with human workers manually adjusting the image to ensure the outcome of the design.
Getting an image digitized will take 24-48 hours and generally costs approximately $5 for every 1000 stitches required.
Here is the link for the Zazzle embroidery page… be forewarned…. the link has been spastic…. perhaps TechCrunch was a bit premature or Zazzle is having technical difficulties….
Here is a link to the Zazzle Embroidery Design Guide
So, what do you guys think of the possibility of custom embroidery from Zazzle? Love the idea? Hate it? Give us some feedback!
6 Comments
October 30th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Yeah, I’m not sold on the whole embroidery thing anyway. Fake embroidery from CP, real embroidery from Zazzle…none of it does anything for me. I just don’t see it being a big seller.
But I could be wrong.
October 30th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Real embroidery is cool, but looks like it’ll be too expensive.
October 30th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
After reading that guide and seeing the complexities involved, and the fact that we have to pay for each design to be prepared for the marketplace, makes it a bit too risky for me.
It definitely has possibilities, just don’t think the marketplace will be flooded with entries based on that upfront fee per design.
I do realize however after the CP Infinistitch marketplace blunders, that Zazzle will end up with only quality embroidery products because of this upfront cost.
hugs
Susan
October 31st, 2008 at 5:56 am
Too rich for my blood. I tried to convert a very simple logo, 2 colors and it was $20. Not so good for the POD-er, but maybe not bad for a small business who only wants a small run of products for employees. Maybe.
November 2nd, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Yeah…. after everything was launched and I had an opportunity to nose around a bit, I think I’ll pass…. if they drop the fees, then I’ll take another look…. but I’m not paying a POD to digitize my designs on the hopes that I “might” make a few sales…. I had baseball hats embroidered for my team this summer at a local business…. the hats were much cheaper than I could get at Zazzle AND there wasn’t a digitizing fee….
NEXT PRODUCT PLEASE…..
November 2nd, 2008 at 11:11 pm
Waaaaay too expensive…as you said, it’s just too easy to find another way. I bought a sewing/embroidery machine. Looking at those prices for comparison, it’ll pay for itself fast.
Also, you can hit a zillion different sites for digitizing a design which you can pull into the machine. Hmmph…I’ll make my own.