Printing your designs on T-shirts is a fantastic way to make some money. If you’re a designer who wants to see their illustrations or graphics come to life, you have a variety of options to help you do it. Two of the biggest players are Teespring and TeePublic, which both make it easy for you to upload your designs and start selling.
All you need to do is set up an account and upload your designs to add them to T-shirts, which will then be printed on demand when people buy them. Your designs can even be printed on other items, from accessories to mugs and phone cases. But which of these two websites is the best one to use? Let’s pitch them against each other to find out which one comes out on top.
Round One: Setting Up as a Designer
Getting started as a design is the first thing you will want to do on any T-shirt website. So how easy is it to set up on either Teespring or TeePublic?
One Teespring, you simply choose “Start designing” at the top of the site. This prompts you to log in or create an account, and you can quickly log in using your Facebook or Google account. Next, you choose the product category that you want to create, from die cut stickers to T-shirts, leggings and pillows. You can then choose a more specific product design, then select if you want to buy or sell.
The “buy” option allows you to create designs and buy them for yourself or create branded team products for your business. The “sell” option allows you to list your design and start making money. You can then start designing, adding an image and text, changing the product color and setting your price.
To set up with TeePublic, click “Designer Set-up” on the homepage. You can create an account with your email address, but can only use Facebook (not Google) for a social sign-in. You will need to choose a username, display name and password. Hover over the account icon and select “Upload a Design”, then choose if you want to upload one file or multiple files.
The image needs to be at least 1500 pixels wide; you will be shown information about size requirements for different products. You can then choose a product title, tags and description. Toggle the different products to choose which ones you want to put your design on, select colors and position your design.
Winner: Teespring – easy set-up, with options for both buying and selling.
Round Two: Product Choice
Both Teespring and TeePublic offer a range of products for your to add your designs too.
On Teespring, you will discover apparel, home decor, phone cases, accessories such as towels and tote bags, and mugs. Some product categories have multiple options, including men’s and women’s T-shirts, hoodies, socks and baby products. Once you choose an item, you can customize it with your image and text, choose background colors and preview your design.
TeePublic has a more limited option of products, although there is still plenty to choose from. They have T-shirts and hoodies, as well as other shirt styles, some child and baby items, and other products including mugs, pillows, phone cases and even wall art and tapestries. You can add your design to multiple products at once, making it easy to create more than one product at a time. You can change the background color and the scale of your design.
Winner: Teespring – a wider selection of products to choose from
Round Three: Analytics and Reports
If you choose to sell your designs through either Teespring or TeePublic, you want to be able to check just how well your products are selling. Luckily, both sites give you options to check if you’re becoming a T-shirt tycoon or if your designs are a flop.
On Teespring, go to the “Analytics” section of your account. It will show you a graph with your orders, individual units sold and profit. You can see a breakdown of where your sales are coming from, your listings and your orders.
On TeePublic, go to “My Account” and find your sales information under “My Sales”. You will see “Next Paycheck”, showing your earnings from the previous month, the current month’s earnings, and the total you have earned. It also shows you the number of items sold, and you can download an Artist Earnings Report.
Winner: Teespring – a clean and clear breakdown of your sales and profits
Round Four: Potential Earnings
Of course, the most important thing is how much you could earn. Each site has different pricing models, which are important to pay attention to.
On Teespring, you’re in charge of how much your products sell for. However, although you get to set the price, you need to keep the base price of the products in mind. For example, a classic men’s T-shirt has a base price of $10.57 or €12.55. This means if you charge $20, you make $9.43. You can set different prices for products fulfilled in the US and in the EU.
However, there are some tools that might affect your profits. If you use the Boosted Network to promote your products, for example, you will earn less from your sales.
TeePublic, on the other hand, has set prices. You can’t control the price you set or how much you earn per item. A men’s classic T-shirt costs $20, which gives you $4 per sale – or just $2 if the item is on sale. This means that TeePublic keeps a huge $16 from a normal sale, which is over 50% more than the amount Teespring keeps.
Winner: Teespring – as long as you can get your designs the attention they deserve, you could earn a lot more from Teespring than TeePublic!
The Overall Winner: Teespring
Teespring is the clear winner from these sites, whether you want to create T-shirts for your team or make money from your designs. It’s more flexible and has the potential to help you earn more. However, you do need to be aware that you won’t automatically make sales simply from uploading your designs. You need to promote your products if you want them to sell.
Was this article written by a Teespring employee, because the main thing I’m getting from this is that Teespring is good simply because it’s simpler. I would assume Teepublic didn’t get more and better reviews for nothing.