By Brenden Prazner

One of the biggest decisions to make when starting an embroidery business is…

Do I digitize in-house or outsource?

In-House Digitizing

In-house digitizing has its advantages, but also has its draw backs.

Digitizing In-House Advantages

Digitizing in-House can give you greater control over the quality and delivery of your products. By digitizing in-house you do not need to rely on another business to deliver your product, and you can schedule the priorities.

Digitizing In-House Disadvantages

Firstly, you have to learn how to digitize. Although software applications such as Wilcom ES make digitizing easy, it still requires a level of experience and skills.

Secondly, digitizing takes time. As a small business and single operator, you may not have the time to digitize.

It is common for new businesses to digitize their own designs to avoid out sourcing fees. However, spending time digitizing takes the owner / operator from the daily task of running their business and attracting new customers.

Finally, by employing a digitizer you will need to pay a regular wage and benefits.

Outsourcing Digitizing

There are many outsourcing options including good local and overseas company’s.

Is your contractor legal?

Ask your digitizing contractor to verify that they are using a legally licensed digitizing system, and seek their permission to verify this with the software vendor.

Software piracy cost the US economy $7.6 billion in 2005, and has a direct and devastating impact on the embroidery industry. For more information on embroidery software piracy, visit www.wilcom.com.au/genuinesoftware.

Outsourcing Digitizing Advantages

By outsourcing your digitizing, you do you occur the expense of employing a digitizer.

It will allow you to focus on your embroidery business, and relive you from the time consuming task of digitizing.

Small edits and changes to a design can also be expensive, plus waste valuable time while the machine is down. For this reason it makes perfect sense to have an embroidery design system capable of performing lettering and editing tasks such as the Wilcom ES 21E Editing system. This will allow you to make the small urgent changes needed to keep your machines running, while you continue to outsource the more difficult and challenging designs.

As your business grows and as you learn more about digitizing, you can investigate the benefits of bringing your embroidery digitizing in-house.

Outsourcing Digitizing Disadvantages

By outsourcing your digitizing you are putting your product delivery into the hands of an external party. Delays and priorities will be out of your control.