EP 16. Is Printify Premium Worth It? | Etsy Tips for Sellers

WYW 7. In today's what you're wondering I'm answering the question "Should I Get Printify Premium?" I'm breaking down exactly how to know when Premium makes financial sense for your shop — and when it doesn't. It comes down to one number, and I'll show you how to find it.

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Transcript

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Hey there, welcome to the Modern Etsy Seller Podcast and What You're Wondering, the segment where I answer one specific Etsy question in under five minutes. I'm Alyssa, a busy working mom with two profitable Etsy shops, and I'm here to help you build yours. Let's get to today's question. The question is, should I be upgrading to Printify Premium? Okay, so that is Printify's paid subscription plan. And the quick answer is yes, eventually, but not until the math says you should. Because the real question isn't should I get premium? It's when should I get premium? And the answer is when Printify Premium or any paid subscription starts making you money instead of costing you money. So let me back up a bit. Printify and many other print providers offer a free plan and a paid plan. The paid plans often give you a discount on the price you pay them every time a product sells. Now the paid plan typically comes with some additional perks, but usually nothing you need in those early lean days of your new business. So going to the paid plan is all about the money you save on each item. So let's look at an example and see how this all works out. Alright, so say you sell cutting boards. On the free plan, you might have to pay the print provider $20 every time you sell a cutting board. But with the paid plan, you only have to pay them $15 when you sell one. That's an extra $5 you make on every single cutting board that you sell. Well, if you pay Printify $39 for the month and only sell one cutting board, you're losing money because you just paid $39 to get five. The math just does not work. So what you have to figure out is how many items you need to sell in a month to cover the cost of the subscription. That's the break-even number, meaning that point where, yeah, you paid Printify $39, but because of it, you also saved $39. And any item you sell beyond that break-even amount in the same month is now bonus money. It's the point where if you don't have the paid plan, you are leaving money on the table. So using the cutting board example, here's exactly how to figure out how many items you need to sell to break even. I'm going to use the monthly cost of $39. That is printify's subscription cost. It is cheaper if you buy the annual plan, but I know most people aren't able to hand over the annual price when they're just getting started. But if you are planning to do that, you would use $24.99 instead because that's what it breaks down to over the course of 12 months. And of course, if you're using a completely different print provider, you want to take a look at their numbers. The first step is figuring out how much you save per item with the paper subscription. For the cutting board, the price without is $20 and the price with it is $15. The difference or the savings per item is $5. Next, take that monthly cost of the subscription and divide it by the amount you save per item. So here you would do $39 divided by $5. That equals $2.8. Then round up to the next whole number. Always up. Even if it's 7.1, you're going up. This one rounds to 8. That means you need to sell eight cutting boards a month to break even. And everyone you sell beyond that means you are now making money by having this subscription. When you hit that number two months in a row, get it, buy it. The odds are in your favor that you'll keep growing. Now, if you sell multiple products, here's how to look at it. Take a look at your last 30 days, and for each product, figure out how many you sold and multiply that by what the cost savings would be per item on premium. Then add those amounts together. And if the total is less than 39, you're not ready. If it's more, you are. So quick example. Say you sold three of product A and the savings per item is $4. That's $12. Then you sold six of product B and the savings per item there was $3. That's $18. Together that's $30. Meaning premium would have saved you $30 last month, but it would have cost you $39 to get there. Not worth it. Check again next month and see where you're at. And listen, if you're sitting here and you're thinking, okay, no, Melissa, this is too much math, then just throw it into Chat GPT, tell it the monthly subscription cost, tell it what it saves per item, and ask it how many items you need to sell to break even. It'll do it in seconds. But remember, a subscription isn't something you jump into just because it feels like the next move. You need to trust the numbers and let them tell you exactly when it's time. All right, so that's a wrap on that question. If you have a question that you would like me to answer on a future episode of What You're Wondering, I would love to hear it. Head to melissacarroll.co slash question or click the link in the show notes to submit it. I'll see you next time.