Cafepress Review 2020 – Build Your Custom Products with Cafepress

CafePress is one of the most popular online Print on Demand platforms that lets you upload your own designs and sell them for a great profit. This process does require you to be creative, but if you can do it yourself, or have someone do it for you then you can make a decent living off it.

Running your own store on Cafepress is not entirely free, but the costs involved are quite low so you can try it out and see if it’s your thing or not.

Today, we are going to put Cafepress through our rigorous test to see how it works, how you can use it for making money online, and what features does it offer. So, without further ado, let’s dive into the Cafepress review to see how it fares in the Print on Demand world.

How Cafepress works

The first step to Cafepress is the creation of your own store. You can setup your own shop on Cafepress and start selling your designs for profit.

It’s very easy to create your account and setup your Cafepress shop. Just head over to Cafepress and click Sign in/Join at the top-right corner and then use your details to create an account.

Now, you have an account on Cafepress and you can start selling your designs on the platform. All you have to do is upload your custom designs, put them on your preferred products, and market those products to make money. It’s a very simple process that newbies can follow without any hassle.

How to add your design to Cafepress

Cafepress makes it very easy to upload your custom designs and share them with the entire Cafepress community. You can sell these designs and earn a great profit as long as your designs are unique and appealing to the masses.

Here’s how you can upload your designs to Cafepress and add products to print your designs on.

From your Dashboard, click Add a design and upload your custom design to the website. Add the design name, add tags, and add a catchy description so people can learn more about your products and designs.

You can also add different products for your design. These include but not limited to mugs, stickers, number plates, clothings, and more.

Cafepress Products

Cafepress offers a great bunch of products from diverse list of categories. These products include clothing, accessories, baby items, home decor, and much more.

You will find almost everything on the platform which makes it easier for newbies to create their favorite products and print their custom designs on these items. Here are all the categories and the products that are available under each category.

MEN

• T-Shirts
• Hoodies & Sweatshirts
• Pajamas
• Underwear
• Joggers

DRINKWARE

• Mugs
• Travel Mugs
• Drinking Glasses
• Straw Tumblers
• Water Bottles
• Shot Glasses
• Coasters
• Flasks
• Steins

WOMEN

• T-Shirts
• Maternity Tees
• Plus Size Tees
• Hoodies & Sweatshirts
• Pajamas
• Underwear
• Leggings
• Joggers

STATIONERY

• Greeting Cards
• Invitations
• Postcards
• Calendars
• Notebooks
• Yard Signs
• Banners

ACCESSORIES

• Bags
• Hats
• Scarves
• Car Accessories
• Neck Ties
• Patches
• Flip Flops
• Jewelry
• Buttons
• Keychains
• Dog T-Shirts
• Golf Balls
• Teddy Bears
• Puzzles
• Balloons

KIDS & BABY

• Baby Bodysuits
• Baby T-Shirts
• Baby Gowns
• Baby Blankets
• Baby Bibs
• Baby Hats
• Burp Cloths
• Kids T-Shirts
• Kids Sweatshirts
• Kids Hats
• Flip Flops

STICKERS

• Banners
• Oval Stickers
• Rectangle Stickers
• Square Stickers

HOME & DÉCOR

• Blankets
• Room Décor
• Bed & Bath
• Aprons
• Pillows
• Magnets
• Ornaments
• Wall Art

CASES & COVERS

• iPhone Cases
• Galaxy Cases
• Laptop Covers
• Tablet Covers
• Laptop Skins
• Mouse Pads

How Much Does Cafepress Store Cost

It’s entirely free to set up your store on Cafepress platform and list custom designed products for sale, but running the store is not completely free.

You have to pay the monthly fee for your CafePress store which can be done in two ways.

You either pay 10% of your monthly earnings with a max charge of $10 which is th best option so far because you don’t have to pay anything upfront.

The second option is upfront payment which costs $6.95 per month and seems like a bad deal because you will be at a loss if you don’t make a sale at all. So, it’s better to go with the first option and be o the safer side.

How Does CafePress Pay Store Owners

You set the profit margin on all your designed products and you get to keep 100% of the profits for yourself. Cafepress also offers bonuses based on the volume of the orders. For example, If you sell over $100 in a month ($100+ of base price only/not including markup), you will receive a 10% bonus on your sales. CafePress offers payments through PayPal and cheque.

Cafepress Shipping

Cafepress offers multiple different shipping methods that all provide great service. The shipping costs are calculated at the checkout for each customer base on the shipping method and quantity of the items in your order.

Most of the packages can be easily tracked via the carrier’s website. To find out the shipping charges, customer needs to add the item to their cart and proceed to checkout. Selecting the shipping option will reveal the costs for that specific shipping options.

Estimated Shipping Timelines are as following:

• Economy: Usually arrival in 7-9 business days
• Standard: Usually arrival in 5-6 business days
• Premium: Usually arrival in 2-4 business days
• Express: Usually arrival in 1 business day

The order may arrive in multiple packages which depends on the quantity, type, and weight of the items in the order.

Production and Shipping Times:

The delivery estimates can be calculated by taking the production time for the order and adding in the shipping time based on the shipping method selected. The items in the order are made to order. The production time for most orders is around 2-3 business days.

Cafepress Alternatives

There are numerous other print on demand services out there that rival Cafepress. Cafepress doesn’t offer integration with Shopify or other ecommerce platforms and some people think of that as a con for the service.

There are other Print on demand services out there that provide seamless integrations with different ecommerce platforms.

Here are some of the top Cafepress alternatives that you can explore if you are looking for integration with Shopify, Etsy, or any other ecommerce platforms.

Printful

Currently considered the best Print on demand app out there. It’s available on the Shopify app store and offers high-quality custom printing with a wide variety of products.

The production and printing is all done in-house and the quality is quite good since everything is checked by the quality assurance department.

Here’s a the full Printful review you can read to understand what Printful offers and how it fares against other services in the field.

Printify

Printify is also an excellent print on demand service that offers a simple add-on for Shopify platform. The Shopify app enables sellers to upload their designs and create custom products. It’s powered by a cutting edge automatic Print On Demand order management system that creates, prints, and delivers custom products to your buyers under you brand’s name.

Store owners get a catalog of couple hundred products which allow you to dropship everything from mugs to t-shirts, and linens. I really loved Printify’s unique ability to connect suppliers with a network of Shop owners in both the USA and UK.

Read our full Printify review to see how this service fares against other print providers in the industry.

TeeLaunch

TeeLaunch is one of the oldest apps available on the Shopify app store, but it did gain popularity very recently. This service is being used by more than 40,000 online stores. This platform also accepts PayPal as their payment method which is a secure payment method loved by Europeans and North Americans.

The service has no upfront fees or subscription costs so you can create a free account whenever you want. Just create your account, upload your designs, and start selling without any problems.

Read the full Teelaunch review to check out the features offered by this print on demand app.

Related Article:
Gooten Review
redbubble review
spreadshirt review
sunfrog review

Conclusion

I personally give Cafepress a 3.5 out of 5.

It’s a solid Print on Demand service that provides great quality products and prints to people anywhere in the world, however, the lack of integration with other ecommerce platforms like Shopify make it very difficult for people to market their products properly.

You have to mostly promote the Cafepress library to people so they can buy your custom designed products. If you want to sell the items on your own website then it’s quite difficult and there’s no seamless way of doing so.

Still, Cafepress is one of the best print on demand services out there that provides high quality products and prints with a reasonable price tag.

Let us know what you think about Cafepress and also tell us about your favorite POD apps or services out there. Comment below.