dropshipping embroidered goods

[TinaK]

Does anyone drop ship their embroidered items for different companies? I would like to know the pros and cons on this and any advice you can give us.

[signman]

Don't know why I didn't get this message as a forward...don't seem to get some once inawhile.
I have done some dropshipping of embroidery, screenprinting, digital printing, etc. over the years-and also work with many ad specialty suppliers that drop ship for me. Dick and Pat up in Vt also have done bulk embroidery for me and drop shipped.
Pros: saves freight-you can have supplier get the goods, imprint, then ship direct to your customers. If embroidered-and they use Sanmar-you can get your blank goods shipped direct from Sanmar (free freight) and then only have freight from them to your account.
Time-saves tons of time, no more back and forth blanks to you to imprinter to you to customer...
Cons: If you don't supply your own shipping labels-client can 'backtrack' and find YOUR supplier and potentially do an endrun around you-OR a competitor can find your supplier off a box label when he visits your client to steal the account.
Misprints, errors-if the goods go direct from supplier to client-you have no chance to catch an error...you have to really trust your supplier
Payment-most all suppliers will NOT do the billing for you-they expect YOU to pay, either 50% up front, balance 30 days, or even full payment up front-and they do NOT care if your customer stiffs you, the goods get lost, or have errors-that is YOUR problem and they will get paid no matter what.
For me-except for clients not within driving distance-I prefer getting the goods shipped to me-so I can double check them for accuracy, and then make a new sales call when I delivr them! Works most of the time-bring in the goods, walk out with another order.
To get around payment problems-we take MC/Visa over the phone-no chance of internet fraud-and always get payment UP FRONT after the customer sees a proof of the item.
IF it's embroidery, I do the digitizing and sewout proof here for them, send that file to the supplier. If it's printed or engraved, I do all the layout here and send the customer a 'visual' file to check.