Print on Demand, or POD as many people know it, is a different way of selling products where printing is done in smaller quantities in a per order basis. Unlike other ways to sell where you usually have to buy in bulk, prepay and hope for the best (if you don’t sell anything suddenly you have a massive stock in your house), print on demand sites are totally based on customer needs.
Some of the most popular print on demand products are mugs, books, mobile cases, home decoration and clothes like pants, t-shirts, hoodies, caps, canvas, bags etc.
The main difference between the regular way of printing and selling stuff and the best print on demand sites is that the latter is becoming a revolution because it makes it easier to sell while minimizing the risks.
With a good Print on demand website you’ll be able to sell on a per order basis without having stock because productions are made after an order is requested, and they will take care of everything related to customer service, including but not limited to: shipping, refunds or returns, customer service chat, inventory, storage, etc.
The main idea is that you as a seller or as an artist will focus mostly on uploading your designs and promoting them to make money and you’ll just receive your profits every certain period of days.
As for your customers, the idea is that they can get products with very unique impressions that are custom made and you normally can’t buy in physical stores. Many people just want to be different or just don’t want to support big brands and would rather have a custom design in their favorite hoodie.
Now that you’re familiarized with the POD (print on demand) market, let’s have a look at the best print on demand websites available in the market so you can start uploading your designs and make money!
Best Print on Demand Websites/Companies
We have considered the following factors when curating our list to help you choose the best print on demand companies based on your needs:
- Is it possible to sell in their marketplace? It helps when you don’t have an audience when a site of this allows you to sell publicly in their marketplace to leverage their traffic. Think of Amazon where millions of visits happen every day and just by uploading a product you can get a ton of exposure without having to market anything or have a following
- Is it possible to sell on your own site? In case you already have a website and you want complete integration to make sales seamlessly without users abandoning your site. Shopify/WooCommerce integration can be very useful as well.
- Huge traffic available: this helps with number 1
- Wide range of products: Some POD sites are good at selling shirts, while others do a ton of things.
- Low base cost: lower costs = higher profit. Need to explain more?
- Design software and UI: If the website is difficult to navigate you’re less likely to launch good designs
- Payment methods: how fast and easy is it to receive your profits?
- Shipping methods: do they support fast local and international shipping?
- Quality: this one is pretty self-explanatory
Alright, here we go! Please keep in mind that at any time you can visit the following POD sites by clicking at the image or name of the company.
1. Printful
Printful is one of the oldest print on demand companies in the game. They’ve been in this market since 2000 (almost 20 years!) and have a unique model that can work well for entrepreneurs.
Printful allows you to promote your products in your own stores and then it communicates with Printful to fulfill and deliver the product.
Printful has the following products available: different types of clothes, accessories, wall art, phone cases and other stuff like towels, bed accessories, etc.
Printful has a good quality of products and allows drop shipping as well, but their main business is to connect website owners with their platform to makes sales and be fulfilled without your customers visiting Printful at all.
This is also great when you’re doing paid ads to market your products as you keep all of the data in your own site to re-market, gather emails or simply measure stats locally.
Printful works on different eCommerce platforms like WooCommerce (WordPress), Shopify, BigCommerce, Squarespace and more.
2. Zazzle
Zazzle is an interesting contender in this list with their super unique customization capabilities. Zazzle offers more than 1,300 items to customize and you can choose art from other designers/artists or simply upload your own design. This is one of the biggest print on demand websites with close to 30 million visits per month.
Some of the products you can print at Zazzle are: t-shirts, bags, invitations, mugs, stickers, clothes for kids and more.
With Zazzle you set up your own royalty rates and you can earn also on referrals. You can join as a designer, maker or associate and everything is free to use!
Their minimum payout is $50 and you can get 15% per referral sale and up to 17% if you do volume.
3. Redbubble
Redbubble is perhaps the largest and biggest print on demand company listed in this article. Their domain receives a lot of traffic with a ton of artwork by a diverse community of designers and artists.
At Redbubble you can sell products like: t-shirts, hoodies, scarves, post cards, notebooks, skirts, phone cases, stickers, etc.
Redbubble is fast and most of their orders are fulfilled in 24-48 hours, which is quite nice if you’re looking for a great customer service.
Payments are made each 15th of the month no matter if you sold 5 or 1,000 items via PayPal or wire bank transfers (USA, UK, AU only)
Redbubble has an easy to user user interface where you can set up your margins and it’s free to join. With a diverse community it’s a top notch site and has a huge customer base.
This one has my personal recommendation. There are many sites like Redbubble in this article but this is by far the best and most popular print on demand site based on traffic and feedback.
4. Teespring
Teespring is one of my old favorites in this list. In fact, my first Print on Demand experiences selling t-shirts online happened on Teespring (you can see my Facebook Teespring case study here).
Initially you could only sell t-shirts but they’ve added a number of products in their market place and overall their design and UI are top notch.
With Teespring, you need to launch campaigns and wait 3-21 days to finish them before the orders are fulfilled. As long as you sell enough shirts Teespring will produce them and pay you after that.
Their marketplace makes it a very competitive print on demand company as they have categories which can be browsed by interests, hobbies, animals, age, locations, favorite sports, music and more. This is one of their unique selling points as users can browse hundreds of designs and they even remarket to your users if you enable that option.
Teespring ships worldwide but USA is their top country where shipping times are 2-5 business days. International shipping takes 10-16 days if you’re in CA/UK or more if you’re in other countries.
With Teespring you can set your own prices, margins and the more you sell, the less you can pay per product.
Teespring allows you to sell products like: t-shirts, hoodies, canvas, mugs, home decoration, gifts, pants, tank tops etc.
You can also contact your customers via email and their analytics dashboard allows you to check every step of the process and create a store if you want to sell more than just a few designs.
5. Society6
Society6 is a print on demand site for creative people who love design and aesthetics. Or at least that’s their motto.
Society6 has products focused on interior decoration like murals, canvas and similar and this is what makes them unique in this market. They do have more products for a total of 30+ items available to customize.
If you’re an art lover Society6 is a great company to promote your products and as always, you can set your margins although each item might have different sizes and specs, making it difficult to calculate without their own user interface.
Products are shipped 4-14 days in the USA and Australia and 2-4 weeks for anywhere else.
6. Sunfrog
Sunfrog was one of the first options I tested back in 2012 and is a great option for starters in the print on demand industry.
They have a ton of tutorials and a decent audience. Also, you can sell some of other people’s products from the market place and still make a commission.
Sunfrog shirts is popular due to their lower prices and while I wasn’t 100% satisfied with the quality of their shirts, they might be OK for most people.
Their marketplace is filled with tons of shirts for geeks and you can search by categories so if you’re into that Sunfrog might be your best choice to get started.
Some of the products you can sell at Sunfrog are: t-shirts, hoodies, shirts, mugs, hats, leggings, etc.
T-shirts are printed in the USA and shipped internationally and you get paid a 45% commission for each item sold (fixed margin).
7. Design by humans
This print on demand website has a good marketplace for creators with a decent sized customer base.
Some of the products you can design at Design by Humans are: t-shirts, mugs, hats, notebooks, buttons, hats, etc.
They offer international shipping but mostly it’s a community of artists supporting each other so you can start making money with your creatives.
You get a good profit margin and they also host design competitions almost every day. Payments are done via PayPal mostly.
8. CafePress
CafePress is a leader in this print on demand industry. You’ve probably heard about it and they have a good audience so you don’t need to make a ton of effort to start selling.
CafePress has a ton of items to sell and offer good margins and lower base costs thanks to being one of the oldest in the list.
Some of the products you can sell at CafePress are: baby clothes, apparel, stickers, buttons, magnets, dog hoodies (LOL yeah, this is a big market!), house items, posters, bags, books and more.
They offer international currencies for USA, Canada, Australia, UK and the European Union.
Artists can also become affiliates and get a percentage of each sale without being your own products. Commissions go up to 15% for affiliates.
9. Custom Ink
One of the print on demand websites for beginners, Custom Ink has a friendly user interface and a good reputation, but it also allows you to create your own fundraiser which is one of their unique points.
Your contributors become like your VC (venture capital) backers so you can start your own company and they can get some shirts with your brand.
Not the most appealing business model but they’re quite unique in that aspect.
10. GearBubble
GearBubble is new in the industry. With new I mean they’ve been available for 4-5 years and so far, they’ve sold more than 2.8 million products.
Their main focus is paid traffic from social media. GearBubble allows you to setup integration with Shopify, Etsy, eBay and even Amazon, harnessing the power and consumer base of the giants in the industry while fulfilling everything for you.
Some of the products you can sell on GearBubble are: t-shirts, hoodies, necklaces, pendants, hats, mugs, pants, etc.
GearBubble also allows you to create your own store and they have a pro membership with great converting templates and checkout methods.
Payments are done via PayPal at the end of the month and their market place allows people to look for items based on top sellers, categories, professions, animals and more.
11. TeePublic
TeePublic is another option to get started in the print on demand business. TeePublic has a community like Design by Humans which is all about supporting artists and helping you with creativity.
It seems like they have a good customer service and offer unique items to customize like laptop cases.
Consider TeePublic as an indie community where you can sign up and create a digital store without having your own site.
Other products you can sell here are notebooks, mugs, tapestries, wall art, etc.
12. Spreadshirt
Spreadshirt is another POD company that makes easy to create and sell custom products. They have an interesting collection of items and they’re based in Germany (most companies in this list are US based).
They have an easy to use interface and a ton of options you can play with as an artist. With over 100 items you’ll have a lot to work with.
Some of the products you can sell at Spreadshirt are: kid’s clothing, water bottles, phone cases, tablet cases, etc.
They usually go for trending items so whatever is new in the market that’s making waves might be available fast at Spreadshirt.
13. Threadless
Threadless is an interesting print on demand site where people submit designs and they’re only approved for sale if it’s voted up by the community. This process takes 1-2 days so plan accordingly.
This might be a challenging way to do business but at the same time it could give you feedback before launching failed products.
Some of the products you can sell at Threadless are: clothes for all ages, home decoration and accessories, notebooks, towels, phone cases and more.
Threadless ships worldwide and artists receive their payments via PayPal after the end of the month.
14. Fine Art America
Fine Art America is a place where artists mostly publish their designs in form of frames and canvas. While they have a ton of items including t-shirts, phone cases, covers, cushions, curtains and bags, the community focuses on the former products.
Similar to Society6, this is a good thing as you can find higher quality products if you’re into home decoration and art.
You can license your designs and even sell your rights.
As always, selling here is free but calculating the margin can be difficult
Conclusions
As you can see, there are a ton of options based on your needs and interests to start selling print on demand items. Whether you’re an artist, an affiliate or you dabble in eCommerce there’s going to be an option for you.
This is great because once you find a winner design you can scale up fast and start selling worldwide in a number of markets while not having to care about customer support, inventory, shipping, etc.
Overall the print on demand business looks like a better alternative to drop-shipping because you’re selling customized products and you can offer value to your clients rather than just flipping things at a higher price.
If you’re just starting, focus on print on demand sites that have a friendly user interface or take an aggressive approach and focus on the biggest websites with more traffic as you’ll have more opportunities to sell without investing in ads or having followers.
If you want to take your business to the next level make sure you learn how to promote your designs in social media like Facebook Ads, Instagram, Pinterest or Snapchat. Some people make thousands per day by promoting the right products to the right audience.
What are you waiting for? Sign up, submit your designs and start selling NOW!
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