Seven Delights Of Selling T-shirts Online: The Pleasures Of Starting A Print-on-demand T-shirt Shop

Some businesses are downright enjoyable, especially if you don't have to put much money on the line. For sheer delight, I'm not sure anything can beat a print-on-demand (POD) T-shirt shop. At a POD web site, you put up your designs in an online "store" of your own, and when someone chooses one of them to have printed on a T-shirt, you get a markup over the printing cost. Your online T-shirt store offers many delights when it is new:

The first delight is getting an e-mail from the POD site when you've made a sale. You put up your first design and wait, and wait... You get a thrill when first e-mail arrives unexpectedly in your in-box. Although they cannot have the thrill of the first, a couple of e-mails can brighten any day.

The second delight is feeling a connection to the people who have bought your designs. You go to your account at the POD site and you see a list of transactions. You look at people's names in the state they live in and you wonder how they chose your design and what it means to them. But you won't know, you'll probably never know. Still, you feel close.

The third delight is receiving your first check. You set your options so that they'll send you a check every time your earnings are at least $25. When the first check comes in the mail, you go out and blow it all celebrating.

The fourth delight is encountering someone who is wearing one of your designs. The first time I saw a woman wearing one of my designs, we were in the same restaurant. I kept beaming her way all evening.

The fifth delight is telling people that you are a web entrepreneur and saying, "Guess how much it's costing me." You tell them, "Nada." You've supplied the computer, the Internet connection, and the time, so that's free. You can set up shop at some POD sites for free. Actually though, it helps if you start your shop already knowing how to -- tee shirt start-ups can be frustrating if you are feeling your way around in the dark -- so you spend a few dollars here and there on books to make your life easier, so you may be honest and just say, "pocket change."

The sixth delight is picking up a blend of new skills. You have to be both right brained and left brained. You need to use an image editor and reflect on how the design looks. You need to find out what people are looking for and the keywords they use when searching. You need to write advertising and promotional pieces, stretching both your prose and your empathy. In addition to being fun to learn, the skills are marketable.

The seventh delight is actually accomplishing something. While between gigs -- as I frequently am -- searching for opportunities online, it's all too easy to get bummed out, to start feeling hopeless and worthless, and to start getting really good at Freecell. It's satisfying at those times to create a new design and put it online.

These are seven of the delights of opening an online, print-on-demand T-shirt shop.