Which is a Better Investment? Going to College or Starting a T-Shirt Printing Business?

Since the onset of the Great Recession, many people now ask if a college education is still worth the expense.

For the purpose of this article, we'd like to compare the value of a liberal arts college education vs. investing in yourself by starting your own T-shirt printing business.

We first published this article a couple of years ago, some people thought this article was ludicrous. Since then, many articles have been written about the "value" of going to college these days. It turns out that we were just ahead of the curve when we posted this article online. 

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While there is certainly no argument that a college education has value, one must now question whether the cost of obtaining that education is worth it. Attending even a public college for four years can spiral into an expense of up to $100,000. And there is certainly no guarantee that when you graduate you will obtain a job in your field of study. Moreover, colleges today produce more graduates than there are jobs to be filled. Unemployment for young people, and this includes college graduates, is at a record high. In addition, when you finish college, you will typically be saddled with a huge debt that you will be paying back for many years to come. Don't get us wrong, if you just finished medical school or are the son or daughter of a US senator, the value of your college education will most likely pay off.

Let's compare investing in yourself and starting your own t-shirt printing business. If you do your planning carefully and follow a well prepared business plan, you will find that you will be able to start a reasonably well equipped t-shirt screen printing business for under $10,000. If you work at your business diligently, it should begin to pay off right away. You will not only be earning money but you will have the ability to extinguish your start up cost from the start.

Here are some facts & figures to consider about earnings potential by owning your own T-shirt printing business. The average white t-shirt costs less than $1.00. By printing that shirt with just one imprint color and selling it to your customer for just $6.00 your profit is about $5.00 per shirt. A typical manual screen printing press can easily produce 100-200 single color prints per hour. An average order for a small business or club is 36 shirts. A 36 shirt order at a profit of $5 per shirt would yield $180.00. Not bad for an hour's work. If you print just one of these orders per day, you would earn around $900.00 per week.
Do the math and calculate what you could make if you were printing several orders per day. In addition to the huge profit potential of the shirt printing business, you can often work at home and spend more time with your family. Additionally, there are significant tax advantages to owning your own small business.

Most wealthy people in this country became wealthy by owning their own business. Being an entrepreneur is certainly not risk free and not often easy. However, being an employee who happens to have a college degree is usually not the way to financial security. With determination, hard work and a belief in yourself, you will find it to be more fulfilling, both financially and spiritually to own your own business--and a t-shirt printing business is one that is worthy of consideration.

To learn how to become a screen printer, you will need training. The Basics of Screen Printing Diploma Course offered by ASPA Institute will get you started quickly. The course is only $99. Total online training where you can learn when it is convenient for you.

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