Customized products are a powerful tool that turns employees into teammates and customers into company advocates. At Logo Depot, it’s our job to provide personalized merchandise that unites a company’s brand and its values at the same time. Ever wonder what the process looks like from start to finish? Here’s what the path to customized merch looks like for our customers.
Step 1 – Budget
The budget that your company has allocated for an order determines what type of products you can purchase and what personalization each one will receive. When that budget is finalized, this is the time to contact Logo Depot. We can help navigate you in the right direction to make a perfect order. Figuring out the budget first will make the whole ordering process much smoother. Plus, this will help your sales representative dial in on the right products.
Step 2 – Merchandise
Your budget determines what type of products you can customize and how much personalization each piece receives. Each of our sales representatives will guide you through this process and introduce you to our showroom full of products at our business location.
Logo Depot Showroom at 3550 N. Comotara St, Wichita, KS 67226
If you are unable to schedule a time to visit, we can send a link to our website for you to look at our premium supplier catalogs. Click here to check it out. This link contains all of the products we offer and can customize. By guiding our customers through the process of picking out their merchandise, we can get a feel for exactly what they are looking for so we can pick the ideal product that would match their project and brand their business.
Step 3 – Sales Order
Once you have selected the items to personalize, Logo Depot creates a quote form called the Sales Confirmation Order for you to approve. This order is a collection of the products and customization of the entire order with pricing. When you approve the Sales Confirmation Order, this is when your goods will be purchased to be delivered to Logo Depot to be customized. From there, it is approximately ten business days until your order is complete unless there are delays with the art proof. For example, the customer might want additional design options, verbiage changes, color modifications, etc. If that is the case, then it might take additional time to get your order completed.
Step 4 – Design
After the Sales Confirmation Order has been approved, then we begin the design step in the customization journey, and it is a critical one. We want to make sure your brand is perfect and print-ready for our machines. Some of Logo Depot’s customers have walked through our doors with existing logos or designs that are ready to go and the perfect file type. If this is you, the design step doesn’t take very long and makes the process go faster.
More often than not, our customers come to us without any graphics knowledge or design abilities, and that’s ok! Logo Depot employs three talented graphic designers to help with the process of creating outstanding logos and designs. They can also rework an existing artwork if it is not suitable for reproducing on our customization machines.
Also, we prefer all designs to be in vector format. This format produces the clearest images when translated to embroidery or print. We also accept raster versions of images as a last resort. For more information about vector vs. raster images, please visit our other article here.
Step 5 – Proofing
Once we have your design, our staff works diligently to deliver an art proof, which is a mock-up of your design on the actual product as it will appear once Logo Depot produces it. Once we deliver this proof to you, you must examine every part. This process ensures that the design is ready for printing. Please double-check all spelling, grammar, colors, items, etc. on the proof. Once a design makes it to production, it’s impossible to make changes without reprinting everything. We ask our customers to look over their proofs closely, just in case.
The above pictures are art proofs for promotional items, screen print, and embroidery.
Step 6 – Confirmation & Production
Once you have an art proof in your hands, the next step is for our customers to approve the proof or send over any changes that may be needed. Once a design is approved, we start processing your order and producing the merchandise.
Lead Times
Time is always an important factor when placing a customizing order. At Logo Depot, we do our best to deliver high-quality personalized merchandise in a timely fashion. Our lead times vary from medium to medium. Turnaround time for most orders usually takes ten business days. As a courtesy to our customers, we do offer rush production for an extra fee. For urgent orders needing completion quicker, there will be extra fees that are determined based on the order.
Step 7 – Delivery
The last stage is the most exciting — delivery! Delivery day is always an exciting time for us because we live to serve our customers. Once our production processes finish, we can arrange for merchandise pickup, ship, or delivery, depending on your location and preference.
Logo Depot spends quality time making sure that your order is correct and packaged nicely for delivery.
Conclusion
As leaders in the printing and customization industry, we orchestrate a wide variety of personalization products. Because of this, it can be difficult for us to provide blanket timelines and price points for you to use as a reference for your future customization projects. Fear not, the info you need to kick off your embroidery, screen printing, or other personalization order is just a call or click away. Our staff is happy to answer all of your questions via phone, email, or through our contact form.
Ready to start your customization journey? Get started here.