18 Dec 2022 4 min read Tutorials

Artist Resources Masterpost

My personal recommendations for getting merch produced and printed.

Last updated: Apr 28, 2023

These are my personal recommendations for getting merch produced and printed! (Please note that since I’m based in the U.S, these will primarily apply to U.S. sellers.)

🌸 = My personal overall recommendation
🌱 = Conscientious or environmentally friendly company
⚠️ = Actively promotes NFTs or questionable political activity; informed purchasing recommended

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Key Tutorials

Business Cards and Postcards

Moo — Luxurious and premium, but expensive. They do allow you to print multiple designs in the same batch, which makes them a good option for merch backing cards.

Printrunner / Uprinting — Most affordable option if you’re ordering in bulk (500 or more units).

The Foil Printing Co. — Best and most affordable option for foil printing. Beautiful results and excellent customer service.

Vistaprint 🌸 — Affordable; great prices without sacrificing printing quality. Often have sales and great for basic cards.

Books

Lulu — Print-on-demand service. Good for short-run books or selling just a few copies.

Mixam🌸 — Beautiful, affordable book printing with a large variety of options and a friendly staff. Best for quantities of 50 or higher.

Charms

Chilly Pig — USA-based manufacturer. High-quality and vibrant printing. Prompt, friendly staff, and great products. A little on the pricier end. Not pre-assembled.

Ink It Labs — USA-based manufacturer. High-quality and vibrant printing. No personal experience, but recommended by a few artist friends. Not pre-assembled.

Juno Creative — Alibaba manufacturer. Affordable prices, quality printing, and a large variety of options. Allows for low minimums. Decent turnaround time. Pre-assembled.

Kuien 🌸 — Alibaba manufacturer. Affordable prices, quality printing, and a large variety of options. Larger order requirements (10 per design and 100 charms total), but boast especially fast turnaround. Pre-assembled.

Vograce — No longer recommended due to varying reports of negative customer experiences.

Pins

Enamel Pin Factory — Highly negative experience with this company. Do not recommend.

Krell 🌸 — Alibaba manufacturer. Great and affordable enamel pin production. Lots of options in plating, accessories, and more.

Prints

Catprint 🌸🌱 — Vivid and gorgeous printing with a variety of beautiful stocks. Pricey for business cards, but good price for art prints.

Shipping Supplies

Clear Bags 🌸🌱 — Offers a huge variety of clear poly bags, including an eco-friendly bioplastic option.

EcoEnclose 🌸🌱 — Focuses on environmentally-friendly packaging and shipping supplies. They specialize in boxes and mailers.

noissue 🌸🌱— Provides environmentally-friendly branding and packaging supplies like tissue paper, stickers, and more that is completely recyclable and compostable.

PaperMart — Offers some poly bags, padded mailers, boxes, tissue paper, and more. Big variety of shipping supplies with good prices and products.

Pure Labels 🌱 — Offers compostable and biodegradable labels and stickers. (Note as of 1/3/20: Their shipping label adhesive is too weak for my taste, so I can’t recommend the shipping labels at this time.)

ULINE ⚠️ — Made for bulk orders or big companies.

Stickers

Catprint 🌱 — Great quality, fast production, and affordable pricing for vinyl and satin paper stickers. Currently only offer kiss cut. Somewhat inconvenient as you have to set up files yourself.

Sticker App 🌸 — Great printing, decent pricing, fast service, and a wide variety of materials.

Sticker Bunnies — Great printing, affordable pricing, fast service, and no minimums. May have a waitlist or long turnaround. Owned and operated by an independent artist.

Sticker Giant — Great for bulk labels and stickers (250+ units). Fast production, shipping, and proofs.

ZapCreatives 🌱 — Great quality and super affordable pricing with a variety of options for vinyl and eco-friendly paper stickers. Takes some time with slower production and shipping.

Washi Tape

Feite 🌸 — Alibaba manufacturer. Beautiful washi tapes and great customer service.

Portfolio Websites

Carbonmade — Beautiful and affordable option for those who want a more dedicated portfolio site. Very easy to maintain, with great customer service. Paid plans starting at $6/mo.

Carrd.co 🌸 — Most affordable option. Great for a simple, clean, affordable portfolio. Free, or paid plans starting at $9/yr.

Portfoliobox — Decent, affordable option for a portfolio. They also offer online shops and blogs. Paid plans starting at $6.90/mo.

Squarespace 🌸 or Weebly — Beautiful aesthetics. Tons of features. Great for artists who want a fully-featured website. Paid plans starting at $12/mo.

tumblr — Surprisingly, tumblr's flexible post structure, customizable themes, and ability to link a custom domain make it a strong option for portfolios and blogs.

Freelancing Websites

AND CO — Rebranded to Fiver Workspace. A robust tool for full-time freelancers. Manage proposals, contracts, time-tracking, invoices, tasks, and expenses. Free plan, and paid plans starting at $18/mo.

Bonsai — A robust tool for full-time freelancers. Track time, create and send legal contracts easily, draft professional proposals, manage projects and expenses, and send invoices. Paid plans starting at $16/mo.

Commiss.io 🌸 — An all-in-one slot organizing system, messaging system, and invoicing system for handling commissions. Free with 5% transaction fee or paid at $10/mo to remove transaction fees.

Cushion 🌸 — A tool for full-time freelancers. Track time, forecast your workload, plan financial goals, and send invoices. Paid plans starting at $8/mo.

Store Websites

Big Cartel 🌸 — A beautiful, simple option for when you want to get your store up and running with as little work as possible. No transaction fees. Free for stores less than 5 products, then paid plans starting at $9.99/mo.

Ecwid — A fully-featured online store solution. You can embed your store in your own domain. No transaction fees. Free for stores less than 10 products, then paid plans starting at $15/mo.

Ko-fi — Mostly a donation platform, but also has shop features. Great for digital downloads, but lacks some features for physical products.

Gumroad ⚠️ — A simple online option that’s great for small shops, digital products, and simple purchases. Free with transaction fees, or a premium plan at $10/mo to eliminate transaction fees.

Shopify ⚠️ — A fully-featured online store solution. Expensive, but has almost everything you’d want in an online store. Paid plans only, starting at $29/mo.

Storenvy — Lots of features and affordable pricing. Personally, I’m not a fan since they have a lot of hidden fees for both artists and customers, but if you do your research then they can be a great option. Free with transaction fees.

Squarespace or Weebly — Beautiful options for those looking for a full site. Expensive, but comes with custom pages, blog features, and more. Paid plans only, starting at $18/mo.

WooCommerce — If you have your own web hosting, you can use this extension for Wordpress to form your own online store. It’s flexible and you don’t have to pay any fees, but you will be responsible for customers’ online financial security.