Print On Demand Sites (PODs) offer artists and buyers a great opportunity to print and customize all sorts of products like fabric, mugs, tablecloths, shoes, tote bags, wallpaper, art prints, cushions, tea towels, duvet covers, throw blankets, scarfs, and the list keeps getting bigger and bigger.

For the consumer it works like this: nothing is printed until a specific order has been received, and only the number of products actually ordered is printed. So, if an order for just one blanket is received, only one blanket is printed, making this an environmentally-friendly way to buy a product, plus much of the time you will be supporting an independent artist (YAY!).

There are two different kinds of PODs for artists/retailers, and both are very popular and growing. The first one (the one I use) consists of the use of a third party website where the artist uploads their designs to the printer/distributor website. Usually you will be able to choose which products you want your design to be sold on (and you can customize this per design), and once you are happy with your selection you can click publish and move on. When a customer orders a product with your design, the POD will process, print and send the product, and you will get a small commission for your art. There is a lot of competition and you will need to upload quite a lot of designs in order to get noticed, but it works just fine as an extra income stream and they are also free to use.

I use the following POD sites:

Spoonflower: Prints custom fabric and wallpaper. More than 4.5 million creatives are part of this community. They have an eco-friendly process and sustainable operation practices.

Society6: For printing giftware, clothes, accessories, homeware, kitchenware, wall decoration, bedware and so much more! Society6 has a big community of independent artists from all over the world. It is not the most user friendly platform, so you need to resize your designs in order to fit all or most of their products, which takes time plus you’ll have to be very patient when uploading because it is slow and crashes all the time. Good thing? another good way to earn some pasive income.

Redbubble: An Aussie one! Pretty similar to Society 6 in the whole process and quality of products. If you are a consumer you won’t find a big difference, but if you are an artist then you’ll love it because the platform is so easy to use and fast that it’ll make every other POD feel bad…

The second type of POD can be also very straightforward, and is also known as drop-shipping service. The ease of use depends on which website platform you are using and if it’s compatible with the PODs you’d like to use.

You connect your own E-commerce website (including Etsy) to your drop-shipping partner’s system (examples include Printful, Printify and Gooten). When an order is made through your website, it’s passed instantly to them for processing, packing it and shipping it directly to the customer.

Clients will receive their orders in packages covered with your brand, appearing as if you shipped it out yourself.

Now you don’t have to hold any stock! And it’s a great way to offer a wide range of products with your own design.

I’ve had a reasonable amount of success with using POD websites, and in my opinion one of the best things is that they eliminate the necessity for you to have or obtain start-up capital before starting your business, as they already have the infrastructure in place for selling, producing and shipping the goods you want to sell as an artist.

POD websites greatly speed up the process of getting your art in the hands of your customers!