A few thoughts on card printing

You will have noticed that more and more creators and companies are switching to Chinese printers. The reason for this is that the Chinese finally know what our standard of quality is and it is simply much cheaper than printing in the USA or Europe. Muuuch cheaper.

I am very aware that in terms of quality, there are still points where USPCC simply outweighs the competition. That, and the fact that many of you appreciate it, is the reason why I don't want to say goodbye to USPCC.

I thought about it for a long time, but the White Remedies and the yellow Black Roses will both be USPCC decks again.

Even if you see relatively large amounts of funding in my Kickstarter campaigns, printing and selling cards is not nearly as lucrative as you might think. Especially not when you have to pay around half of it to the tax office. So of course I'm also grateful for cheaper alternatives if they deliver high quality.

Custom decks peaked 4-5 years ago. Back then, it was possible for a few to really sell a lot. I remember a stupid comment I read somewhere where someone said that Black Roses wouldn't sell much because I "only" print 2500 decks every time. Apart from the fact that this is not true, I took this as motivation to simply print much more in the following campaigns. 4500 decks became my standard for 2020-2021.

With the help of Murphy's Magic, I was able to print and sell these quantities. But even Murphy's has become more cautious due to falling sales and no longer orders as much as they used to. Murphy's Magic is still a huge help to me, but back then I could just print cards without worrying, knowing that Murphy's would take enough off my hands. Today, I have to think carefully about every step I take to avoid digging myself a financial grave.

I don't have the exact figures in my head, but I assume that the last Brown Remedies deck sold so little that the printing costs were not recouped. I knew from the start that this wouldn't be the most commercial deck in terms of color, but I wanted to stay true to my idea and print all the colors that the Rounders have. But of course I was hoping for a little more.

Since the beginning of the year, USPCC has increased the minimum order quantity from 1000 decks to 2500 decks. I partly understand the move as they still have enough work. On the other hand, it motivates even more people to print in China. And this increase to 2500 decks made me hesitate once again whether USPCC is the right decision, as I was also thinking of printing even less than 2500. USPCC also increased their prices again this year. That's what they doing for the last 3 or 4 years already. Which is yet another reason for China.

Another big advantage that speaks for China is the short turnaround time. More and more people are currently printing with WJPC, which is why the turnaround time is likely to increase by 1-2 weeks in the future. But even if WJPC needs 6 weeks instead of 4, that would still be significantly faster than USPCC with 5 months. The company who printed the Phantom Edition even apologized that they needed 2 instead of 1 week. It's simply unbeatable and allows you to plan things much more spontaneously.

To cut a long story short, I wanted to give you an insight into all the different aspects that need to be considered in order for a deck to be printed in the first place.

Thanks a lot for reading.

Much love

Daniel