What To Consider Before Buying An Expensive Embroidery Machine
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There is a list of common things to consider before buying an expensive embroidery machine. But, the common checklist fails to address a few problems faced after making such a purchase. Therefore, we will address the common things to consider and then progress towards asking those deeper questions.
The Average Things
What do you want to embroider?
Before purchasing an embroidery machine, the most important question to ask is, “What do you want to embroider?” For those who embroider quilts, hoop size matters most. While multiple needles allow users to change thread less often, the larger hoop is critical because it allows quilter to work with large quilt tops.
On the other hand, a person who wants to embroider hats will need a machine with a free arm and a specialized hat hoop. “What do you want to embroider?” answers a lot of questions. But, this question should always be followed by a secondary question.
What is your intention?
For a person who is using the machine for a hobby, budget and the amount of space available is all there is to consider. However, a vast majority of people seeking an expensive embroidery machine aren’t just buying for a hobby. They are buying to make income with a home business. This small piece of information changes a lot of things because it means there are a lot more factors to consider aside from budget and machine storage space. So, this means we must ask much deeper questions.
Deeper Questions
Do you have a real problem to solve?
Social media makes it seem like anyone can purchase an embroidery machine and have an instant business. But, this idea couldn’t be any further from truth. In reality, businesses form to solve problems for customers. So, nobody can just buy an embroidery machine and find instant success.
For example, there are some embroiderers who gained real success by selling custom embroidered birthday shirts and tutus for children online. Their businesses blossomed because they went shopping and found no custom birthday gear available. After discovering others desired birthday gear too, these entrepreneurs turned their frustrations into a true business opportunity.
But now, however, there are many copycats attempting to sell the same thing on the same platforms. A copycat business earns little money because a problem is no longer being solved. Let face it, how many birthday shirts does the public truly need?
Who are your customers?
Entrepreneur found a problem in the marketplace and assumed embroidery would be the least thing they could do to solve this problem. They shared their business idea with others who told them it was great plan. But after buying equipment, renting a space, and embroidering up a bunch of things, none of the people who said it was a great idea bought anything and the business failed.
Just in case you missed what the entrepreneur did wrong, here’s a breakdown. Actions say a lot more than words. Therefore, you cannot rely of what people say. You have to base your actions off what they do. For this reason, it is essential to TEST IDEAS BEFORE MAKING AN INVESTMENT.
How To Test Ideas…
It is best to take pre-orders on ready-made embroidery. This gives you the opportunity to gauge whether or not there is true interest in what you would like to offer. When a pre-order list gets tall, your onto something. This means you can go ahead and buy your embroidery machine with confidence. However, when your preorder offer fails to flourish, you go back to the drawing board.
The same thing rings true for selling custom embroidery services. Do a temporary popup shop. The first orders can be fulfilled on a cheap used embroidery machine or even via outsourcing. When there is an abundance of orders, you know it makes sense to buy the expensive machine you’ve been wanting. But if there isn’t an abundance, you have to go back to the drawing board.
Where are you going to find your customers?
The average person thinks they can just set up shop online and have a successful business. However, this isn’t assumption isn’t the full truth. The overwhelming majority of business owners think platforms like Etsy, eBay, and Amazon provide free traffic without too much effort. But, this isn’t 100% true because it takes work to make proper listings and use keywords that will attract customers.
When the sales come in, the business owner thinks they have made it. But, the major downfall of using a platform is the lack of business recognition. Nobody says, “Bought this from Joe’s Embroidery.” They say, “I got this off Etsy!” This creates a problem because the moment AI flags the account for a perceived error, your entire business is closed.
For this reason, the “Where to find customers” cannot be exclusively Amazon, eBay, or Etsy. You need a brand with a website and other places for customers to buy your products. This means you must find out where your target audience congregates and go find them.
Where are you going to store inventory?
People think about where to store the embroidery machine. But, they often overlook where to store the inventory. Embroidery business takes a lot of inventory because you need blanks to embroider upon, interfacing, hoops, and thread. All of this stuff takes up a lot of room.
It used to be easy to wait until an order was received before buying blanks from a supplier. Now, the same thing is more difficult because of supply chain shortages. This means you do need to have a few items available in order to fulfill orders.
Before buying an expensive embroidery machine, you must think about where you are going to store the inventory. Without the space to store up inventory, you’ve got a problem!
What is the cost of inventory versus the revenue?
Inventory and cost of supplies can often outweigh the cost of buying a multi needle embroidery machine. For this reason, it’s important determine:
- How many supplies you need in order to fulfill orders.
- The cost of those supplies
- Potential revenue
When the cost of supplies outweighs the revenue, your business idea no longer makes sense.
If you need to sell equipment, how will you accomplish this?
You’ve ask all the important questions before buying an expensive embroidery machine. But, did you consider what you will do in the event things don’t work out?
The overwhelming majority of embroidery machine shops don’t accept buy backs and only take trade ins. This is fortunate for anyone who want to upgrade embroidery machines, but very unfortunate for those who desire to sell. Private sellers are often forced to resell their embroidery machines on platforms like Craiglist and FaceBook Marketplace because their equipment is too heavy to ship. Since there aren’t many people from the public interested, your machine will sit for months.
Machines not only take a long time to sell, but they often don’t fetch anywhere near their actual value. In spite of embroidery machines having very few hours of use, they often sell for less than half cost. Used machines have so little interests in the second hand market because buyers typically don’t want to take a chance on a used machine that costs so much money. Instead, buyers gravitate towards brand new machines because they come with a warranty and payment plan. For buyers like myself, payment plans always win over cheaper preowned machines because they give you opportunity to invest more in hoops, thread, and other accessories.
Since it is so difficult to re-sale an embroidery machine, it is important to consider all the variables mentioned above before making a decision.
All things Considered
You’ll never be able to think of everything. But, this list was just of the most important things to consider before buying an expensive embroidery machine. If you’ve got anything else to add to this list, stick it in the comments below.
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